This issue is not based on my usual HRI research. It is based on a robot that came up to me in a jewellery shop while I was travelling.
I was in a shopping centre and it was completely unexpected. This cutie rolled over making funny noises, something between a baby, a cat and a nice bird. It sounded like an invitation to play. It moved its eyes, rolled around on its wheels and raised its arms. Well, they look more like wings :) Overall it resembles a penguin. A cute one.
It was a LOVOT, made by the Japanese company GROOVE X. It is a companion robot designed purely for emotional connection, not tasks. It recognises people and asks to be picked up. The black cylinder on top is the "horn". It holds a 360° camera, a microphone and sensors.
The shop owner said they have it to attract customers. It totally works! I watched people and nobody could ignore it.
I couldn't resist holding it. The cover is soft like fur and it was warm. At the time I guessed that was the electronics working inside. It is not. GROOVE X founder Kaname Hayashi wanted it to have a warm body from the start, like a warm blooded animal. It felt almost like holding a baby. It was my first time holding a robot and it was such a pleasant experience!
Here is what stayed with me. We assume people accept robots once they understand them. So we explain their features, safety, benefits. But nobody explained anything to me in that shop. My hands did the convincing.
There is research behind this. In 2012 Jiaqi Nie, Michelle Pak, Angie Lorena Marin and S. Shyam Sundar ran a small study. 39 people watched a horror film clip. Some held a warm robot hand, some a cold one, some none. Warmth and handholding increased feelings of friendship and trust toward the robot.
Psychologists also have a name for the bigger pattern. Robert Zajonc called it the mere exposure effect. The more we encounter something, the more we tend to like it.
If you build or deploy robots, this matters. Most people meet your robot for the first time on rollout day, with a safety briefing. That is a cold first meeting. Let them meet it earlier, somewhere with no pressure. Let them touch it, stop it and move it by hand where that is safe. Your robot is probably not furry. It can still be familiar before it becomes a colleague.
Later on my trip I went to the Seoul Robot & AI Museum and met those cuties again. Three of them in a small garden. I played with them a bit and watched six year old kids do the same. Nobody explained anything to them either. They just had fun.
Robots are already part of their lives and will be even more so in the future, which is not that far. Those kids will not need to be convinced. The rest of us might need to hold one first.