Affective and Cognitive Reactions to Robot-Initiated Social Control of Health Behaviors

Health-related social control refers to intentional attempts to influence people's health behaviors, often seen in personal relationships. Social robots hold promise in influencing people’s health by exerting health-related social control, but it is unclear which social control strategies used by robots would be appropriate and potentially effective. This paper explores the effects of positive versus negative, and relationship-oriented versus target-oriented social control strategies from a robot on people’s affective and cognitive reactions. In an online video prototype study, participants viewed scenarios of a robot companion trying to influence them to change their sedentary behaviors by using varied social control strategies. Our results showed that positive (vs. negative) strategies by the robot elicited stronger positive affect, enjoyment, perceived social appropriateness, reduced perceived threats to freedom, and strengthened behavioral intention. Meanwhile, relationship-oriented (vs. target-oriented) strategies elevated people's negative affect, reduced enjoyment and perceived social appropriateness, elevated perceived threats to freedom, and diminished behavioral intention. Given these findings, we give recommendations for designing influence strategies for social robots in the context of health behavior change.