I Designed It, So I Trust It: The Influence of Customization on Psychological Ownership and Trust Toward Robots.

Customization has been widely studied in the context of information systems and interfaces, but research on customization in human-robot interaction (HRI) is scarce. However, customization and user involvement may exert positive effects regarding attitudes and trust toward robots, hence improving HRI quality. The aim of the present work is to contribute to the theoretical understanding of customization in the HRI context by testing whether customization (none, low, or high) of a robot would elicit feelings of psychological ownership (PO), which, in turn, would increase trust toward the robot. Moreover, we hypothesized that the more people customize a robot, the less they would tend to anthropomorphize it. In line with our predictions, customization (vs. none) significantly increased psychological ownership and trust toward the robot. Further, the level of customization affected perceptions of robot agency. Additionally, PO mediated the effect of customization on trust toward the robot. The implications of these findings for research on HRI are discussed.