Anne Arvola

VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland

Papers

Total Citations

141

H-Index

About

Anne Arvola’s research lies at the intersection of human-robot interaction, social robotics, and technology acceptance in public spaces. Her work focuses on understanding how people—especially children—respond to social robots deployed in real-world environments, moving beyond controlled lab studies to capture authentic, spontaneous interactions. In her highly cited study “Hello Pepper, May I Tickle You?” (108 citations), she observed that the social robot Pepper quickly drew crowds of children in a shopping mall, particularly when adults were already engaged with it, revealing the contagious and social nature of human-robot engagement. Her follow-up work, “Monitoring the Acceptance of a Social Service Robot in a Shopping Mall” (33 citations), addresses a critical gap in the field: how perceptions evolve when the novelty of a robot fades over repeated exposures. By conducting longitudinal surveys in the same service setting, Arvola provides valuable insights into the sustainability of user acceptance. Her field-based, observational approach has made her a key contributor to understanding the social dynamics of robots in everyday life, offering practical guidance for designing robots that integrate seamlessly into public spaces.