TY - GEN
T1 - Why Do Service Robots Fail? A Systematic Literature Review from a Service Design Perspective
AU - Yang, Sanqi
AU - Park, Jaehyun
AU - You, Sangseok
AU - Chang, Younghoon
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2026 Owner/Author.
PY - 2026/3/16
Y1 - 2026/3/16
N2 - Service robots are widely deployed to address labor shortages and improve service quality, yet many still fail in practice. Most research has focused on the positive, overlooking why they fail. To address this gap, our study examines service robot failures from a service design perspective, focusing on design features. To validate this, we conducted a systematic literature review of 863 studies and selected 34 as our data sample. We identified 17 robot design features across three service design aspects and proposed an integrated framework that explains how these features lead to service failures. Theoretically, this study provides a framework for explaining service robot failures from a service design (S-D Logic) perspective, addressing a gap in HRI and service design research. In practice, this study offers actionable guidance for practitioners on improving the design of service robots, their human-robot interaction, and their system integration in real-world service environments.
AB - Service robots are widely deployed to address labor shortages and improve service quality, yet many still fail in practice. Most research has focused on the positive, overlooking why they fail. To address this gap, our study examines service robot failures from a service design perspective, focusing on design features. To validate this, we conducted a systematic literature review of 863 studies and selected 34 as our data sample. We identified 17 robot design features across three service design aspects and proposed an integrated framework that explains how these features lead to service failures. Theoretically, this study provides a framework for explaining service robot failures from a service design (S-D Logic) perspective, addressing a gap in HRI and service design research. In practice, this study offers actionable guidance for practitioners on improving the design of service robots, their human-robot interaction, and their system integration in real-world service environments.
KW - Design features
KW - Human-robot interaction
KW - Service design
KW - Service robot failures
KW - Systematic literature review
UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/105035839414
U2 - 10.1145/3757279.3788665
DO - 10.1145/3757279.3788665
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:105035839414
T3 - HRI 2026 - Proceedings of the 21st ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction
SP - 108
EP - 118
BT - HRI 2026 - Proceedings of the 21st ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction
A2 - Torre, Ilaria
A2 - Baillie, Lynne
A2 - Smart, William D.
A2 - Graaf, Maartje De
A2 - Gombolay, Matthew
PB - Association for Computing Machinery, Inc
T2 - 21st ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction, HRI 2026
Y2 - 16 March 2026 through 19 March 2026
ER -