How Anthropomorphism Affects User Acceptance of a Robot Trainer in Physical Rehabilitation

Developments in social robotics raise the prospect of robots coaching and interacting with patient during rehabilitation training assuming a role of a trainer. This raises questions regarding the acceptance of robots in this role and more specifically, to what extent the robot should be anthropomorphic. This paper presents the results of an online experiment designed to evaluate the user acceptance of Socially Assistive Robots (SARs) as rehabilitation trainers, and the effect of anthropomorphism on this matter. User attitudes were surveyed with regards to three variations of a scenario where the robot with varying levels of anthropomorphism acts as a trainer. The results show that 1) participants are accepting towards SAR-assisted rehabilitation therapies, 2) anthropomorphism influences patient's perceived self-efficacy and attitude towards the system. A second survey studied inventoried issues regarding patients' acceptance of such systems, pertaining to technology acceptance, patient needs for rehabilitation training and the effect of anthropomorphism. Based on the above findings we propose user-informed design implications for improving user acceptance is rehabilitation settings.