Health Professionals’ Views on the Use of Social Robots with Vulnerable Users: A Scenario-Based Qualitative Study Using Story Dialogue Method

We used the story dialog method (SDM) to gather the viewpoints of health professionals about the use of social ro-bots in the home and healthcare services with vulnerable users. SDM consists of participants bringing stories that are discussed together. The aim of the study was to address universal design and accessibility issues with robots in specific use situations. Three social robots were used for this purpose in four stories: TIAGo, Romibo and robot companions. SDM method was used in two workshops with eight participants (33 invited, 12 re-cruited, and 8 participated in the end). The participants uncov-ered issues regarding ethics, responsibility, use of data, infra-structure, design, and user concerns based on provided stories and own experiences. These issues provide important aspects that should be considered when using robots with vulnerable us-ers and ensuring that a robot is usable by as many people as pos-sible. The main contribution of the paper is introducing the SDM method to Human-Robot Interaction community, as well as find-ings around universal design and accessibility of robots, in order to create more inclusive social robots.