The rise of social robots cannot be stopped. However, we can try to understand their implications better to prevent potential harm to users and the society at large. In this track, we seek to identify what possible implications (positive and negative) social robots have on society in general (macroview). Second, we aim to identify how robotics developers can optimize design procedures to foster a positive interaction between social robots and their end-users (micro-view). This dialog should help to identify relevant public policy considerations, as well as inform current debates on ethics concerning social robots to ensure user well-being.

Track Leaders

Werner Kunz (werner.kunz@umb.edu) is Associate Professor of Marketing and director of the digital media lab at the University of Massachusetts Boston, an interdisciplinary global network of researcher and practitioners to answer the challenges in the new Digital Media era. His research interests are in digital & social media, innovation, and service research. His work has been published, amongst others, in the International Journal of Research in Marketing, Journal of Retailing, British Journal of Management, Journal of Medical Internet Research, Journal of Business Research, Journal of Service Management, and Computational Statistics and was awarded multiple times.

Arne de Keyser (arne.dekeyser@edhec.edu) is assistant Professor of Marketing at EDHEC Business School. Prior to joining EDHEC, he was member of the Center for Service Intelligence (Ghent University – Belgium) and a visiting researcher at Boston College (USA). His research focuses on customer experience, service failure/recovery and frontline technology infusion. Amongst others, his research has been published in the International Journal of Research in Marketing, Journal of Business Research, Journal of Service Management and Journal of Service Theory and Practice and was awarded with multiple recognitions, including the SERVSIG Best Dissertation Award.