Max Robotics — Global Service Robot Directory + US Certification

About

Youn-Kyung Kim is a pioneering researcher at the forefront of human-robot interaction (HRI) in retail and service environments. Her work fundamentally explores how consumers perceive, trust, and engage with humanoid service robots—from fashion advisors to retail assistants. Kim’s major contributions lie in identifying the psychological and social drivers that determine whether shoppers accept robots as shopping companions. Her landmark 2022 study on humanoid retail service robots, cited over 300 times, demonstrated that a robot’s perceived usefulness, social capability, and appearance are critical to fostering positive human-robot interaction. She has also advanced understanding of consumer privacy, showing how self-interest and social dynamics influence willingness to share personal data with fashion sales robots. Kim’s methodological innovations are notable: she employs sophisticated techniques like psychological network analysis and crisp-set qualitative comparative analysis (csQCA) to map the complex factors behind robot adoption. Her recent work developing the Artificial Social Intelligence (ASI) Lite-Scale provides a practical tool for evaluating robots’ social competence. With a growing citation impact exceeding 470 total citations, Kim is shaping how retailers and technologists design socially intelligent robots that consumers can trust.