Expectation vs. Reality: Attitudes Towards a Socially Assistive Robot in Cardiac Rehabilitation

Currently, Social Assistive Robotics (SAR) is widely explored in different areas and scenarios. In cardiac rehabilitation, SAR has been recently implemented as a tool to improve the quality of the procedures and support patients to boost their performance. As cardiac rehabilitation comprises numerous sessions, such systems must guarantee to be effective in the long term. Therefore, to achieve this goal, it is important to understand how users, namely patients and clinicians who mostly know the needs and the therapy environment, perceive this technology. In this context, this paper presents the assessment of the attitudes towards a social robot in order to evaluate the expectation of potential new users, and perception of users who interacted with the social robot during a period of 18 weeks performing cardiac rehabilitation. A total of 43 participants (28 patients and 15 clinicians) were included in the study, and acceptance and perception factors were evaluated through a modified UTAUT questionnaire model and open discussion sessions. Results show that 75% of patients have positive thoughts regarding the usefulness, utility, safety, and trust perceived of a social robot, and 80% of clinicians consider that the robot is a useful tool for cardiac rehabilitation. Similarly, a more positive perception was noticed after the users interacted with the robot. Furthermore, this perception study allows the enhancement of the social model of interaction in the future, aiming to provide a more natural interaction trough personalized features, increasing social abilities and engagement of the users during the therapy.