'In That Small Space with Just the Two of Us': User Experiences with Cumpa in a Robotic Counseling Center

Abstract

The growing demand for mental health support has highlighted the limitations of traditional counseling accessibility, increasing the usage of digital mental health interventions. There has been a rising interest in using robots to support mental health due to their benefits in engagement and rapport. Capitalizing on the opportunity of placemaking for designing a feasible robotic digital mental health intervention, our study explores the Robot Counseling Center (RCC) and its robotic counselor, Cumpa, designed to improve mental health accessibility and user engagement. A two-week field study with 20 participants evaluated RCC's impact on their mental health, engagement, and sense of place within a counseling environment. Results indicate that RCC positively influences emotional awareness and engagement. Our findings provide insights into the role of social robots in mental health interventions and offer design implications for developing robotic counseling centers as supportive, effective spaces, contributing to building better places and interactive systems.