How Do People Accept Robot in Public Space? A Cross-Cultural Study in Germany and Japan

TL;DR

This cross-cultural study compares German and Japanese perceptions of autonomous cleaning robots in public spaces, highlighting cultural differences in acceptance and influencing factors.

Contribution

It provides novel insights into how cultural norms and emotions affect robot acceptance, emphasizing the importance of culturally adaptive design.

Findings

Germans show higher acceptance of robots than Japanese.

Social Norms and Trust are key predictors of acceptance across cultures.

Functional perceptions influence acceptance in Germany, while trust and emotions influence Japanese acceptance.

Abstract

With the increasing deployment of robots in public spaces, encounters between robots and incidentally copresent persons (InCoPs) are becoming more frequent. However, InCoPs remain largely underexplored in the literature, particularly from a cross-cultural perspective. Therefore, the present study investigates cultural differences in InCoPs' existence acceptance (EA) of autonomous cleaning robots in public spaces among Japanese and German participants. Online survey results revealed that Germans showed significantly higher EA. Social Norms and Trust were the strongest positive EA predictors across cultures. More specifically, for Germans, EA was directly influenced by Usefulness, Interest and Anger, showing a functional-affective pattern where functional perceptions boost EA and anger suppresses it. For Japanese participants, Trust, Surprise and Fear were the direct associational factors, forming a trust-emotion pattern. These findings reveal cultural influences on cognitive and emotional drivers of public robot acceptance, emphasizing the need for culturally adaptive robot design.