Gathering healthcare service robot requirements from young people's perceptions of an older care robot

In this paper, we address the question of gathering young people's perceptions about healthcare service robots. In this study, 65 University students (aged 16-30 years) used our healthcare robot system for medication reminding, vital signs measuring and Skype. Findings showed that young people rated the robot's usefulness and ease of use quite highly and thought medication reminding and vital signs measuring would be most useful for older people, but also somewhat useful for children, teenagers and young adults. They rated the Skype function as suitable for all ages, especially teenagers. There were no significant gender differences in ratings except women thought the medication reminding service would be less useful for younger adults. In conclusion, a robot designed to assist older adults in healthcare may also be acceptable to younger users and the results of the study will help understand further requirements gathering from younger people with chronic illness regarding their unmet needs.