In the hospitality and tourism sectors, service robots have become increasingly adopted by companies to facilitate frontline service to reduce human labor, improve efficiency and provide better customer experience. In addition, the COVID-19 pandemic has intensified consumers’ demand for service robots to reduce human contact. To better understand the impact of service robots in the service sector, researchers have been examining user behavior of different technologies. While prior empirical studies have mainly focused on utilitarian-based acceptance models, other perspectives, such as the interpersonal relations, have been largely overlooked. With the ubiquitous of social media, people become connected but alone, leading to negative effects on interpersonal relations.

• Min Yan(University of Essex, UK)
• Qionglei Yu(Newcastle University, UK)