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Warm feelings about human-looking robots can turn icy when bots blunder
If a robot worker makes a mistake on the job, or annoys customers, businesses may not give it a pink slip and a cardboard box for its office belongings, but companies may be forced to shut down these expensive machines, according to a team of researchers.
Knowing how to better design and manage these robots may help service industry firms both avoid losing their investments in the robots, as well as secure an increasingly necessary source of extra help, the team added.
In a series of studies on robots used in service industry settings, such as restaurants and hotels, the researchers found that people’s reactions to robot gaffes may be influenced by whether the robots look like humans, or humanoid; or mostly lack human features, or non-humanoid. The team also uncovered strategies that humanoid robots can use to recover from mistakes with customers, according to Lisa Bolton, professor of marketing and the Frank and Mary Jean Smeal Research Fellow at Penn State’s Smeal College of Business.