Cobotic service teams and power dynamics: Understanding and mitigating unintended consequences of human-robot collaboration in healthcare services

Ilana Shanks, Maura L. Scott (), Martin Mende (), Jenny Doorn () and Dhruv Grewal ()
Additional contact information
Ilana Shanks: Stonybrook University
Maura L. Scott: Arizona State University
Martin Mende: Arizona State University
Jenny Doorn: University of Groningen
Dhruv Grewal: Babson College

Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 2025, vol. 53, issue 2, No 8, 463-489

Abstract: Abstract In cobotic service teams, employees and robots collaborate to serve customers. As cobotic teams become more prevalent, a key question arises: How do consumers respond to cobotic teams, as a function of the roles shared by employees and robots (robots in superordinate roles as team leaders and humans in subordinate roles as assistants, or vice versa)? Six studies, conducted in different healthcare settings, show that consumers respond less favorably to robot-led (vs. human-led) teams. In delineating the process underlying these responses, the authors demonstrate that consumers ascribe less power to robot (vs. human) team leaders, which increases consumer anxiety and drives downstream responses through serial mediation. Further examining the power dynamics in cobotic service encounters, the authors identify boundary conditions that help mitigate negative consumer responses (increasing consumers’ power by letting them choose the robot in the service team, leveraging consumers’ power distance beliefs, and reinforcing the robot’s performance capabilities).

Keywords: Cobotic service teams; Cobotics; Healthcare; Power; Anxiety; Technology (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11747-024-01004-1 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:joamsc:v:53:y:2025:i:2:d:10.1007_s11747-024-01004-1

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.springer ... gement/journal/11747

DOI: 10.1007/s11747-024-01004-1

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science is currently edited by John Hulland, Anne Hoekman and Mark Houston

More articles in Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().