Perception of Society’s Trust in Care Robots by Public Opinion Leaders

Abstract

The rapid demographic shift toward a greater percentage of the elderly population increases the need for welfare services. Welfare technology and especially care robots can be regarded as an important measure to counteract such demographic challenges. However, when implementing new technologies, structured information is of immense importance to develop societal trust. Frequently, research addresses trust solely at the level of the end-user. However, trust at the level of opinion leaders and political decision-makers is also relevant as they are catalysts for trust. This study aims to detect the perceived trust level of users from the viewpoint of opinion leaders (politicians, insurance organizations, and media) in the Swedish, Finnish, and German society. Furthermore, this study uses qualitative expert interviews and identifies four trust categories: trust in the health care system, trust in regulations, trust in technology, and interpersonal trust. The findings stress that targeting only the end-users is not sufficient for developing technology trust in society.