Quality (philosophy)

Marketing

Robot

Philosophy

Neuroscience

Service robot

Service (business)

Tourism

Archaeology

Economics

Computer science

Business

Workforce

Service quality

Human–robot interaction

Process management

Psychology

Geography

Epistemology

Focus group

Artificial intelligence

Economic growth

Knowledge management

Perception

Journal of Hospitality Marketing & Management

Hotel industry started to adopt service robots, which are considered a future workforce. However, no attempt was conducted to examine the dimensionality of service quality of service robots. This paper aims to understand the influence of human–robot interaction from the viewpoint of hoteliers and guests. Two studies are conducted in this respect. Study 1 organizes focus-group interviews with hotel managers from various departments to elicit themes related to guest–robot interaction and robot-delivered services. Based on the findings in Study 1, Study 2 conducts an experiment to examine and compare hotel guests’ perceptions about the quality of services provided by human staff and service robots, as well as their joint services. Human staff services are perceived higher than the services of service robots in terms of interaction quality and physical service environment. However, no significant difference in outcome quality is noted.

Service robots in hotels: understanding the service quality perceptions of human-robot interaction