Between Anthropomorphism, Trust, and the Uncanny Valley: a Dual-Processing Perspective on Perceived Trustworthiness and Its Mediating Effects on Use Intentions of Social Robots

Designing social robots with the aim to increase their acceptance is crucial for success of implementation. However, even though increasing anthropomorphism often seen as a promising way achieve this goal, uncanny valley effect proposes that can be detrimental unless are almost indistinguishable from humans. Against background, we use dual processing theory approach investigate whether an perceived trustworthiness (PT) observed and how differs between intuitive deliberate reasoning system. The results experiment four conditions 227 participants provide support effect. Furthermore, mediation analyses suggested intention decreases through both reduced PT medium levels anthropomorphism. high (indistinguishable real human), only determined intention. Consequently, our indicate advantages pitfalls anthropomorphic design.