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Exploring customers' attitudes to the adoption of robots in tourism and

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JHTT
12,4
762
Received 12 September 2020
Revised 8 January 2021
20 February 2021
16 June 2021
3 July 2021
26 July 2021
16 September 2021
Accepted 17 September 2021
Journal of Hospitality and
Tourism Technology
Vol. 12 No. 4, 2021
pp. 762-776
© Emerald Publishing Limited
1757-9880
DOI 10.1108/JHTT-09-2020-0215
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
https://www.emerald.com/insight/1757-9880.htm
Exploring customers’ attitudes to
the adoption of robots in tourism
and hospitality
Mohamed Abou-Shouk
College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences, University of Sharjah, Sharjah,
United Arab Emirates and Faculty of Tourism and Hotels, Fayoum University,
Fayoum, Egypt, and
Hesham Ezzat Gad and Ayman Abdelhakim
Faculty of Tourism and Hotels, Fayoum University, Fayoum, Egypt
Abstract
Purpose – This study aims to explore the factors affecting customers’ attitudes to the adoption of robots in
hotels and travel agencies.
Design/methodology/approach – Structural equation modelling was used to test the extended
technology acceptance model based on data collected from 570 customers of hotels and travel agencies.
Findings – The findings revealed that hotel customers have more positive attitudes to service robots than
their peers in travel agencies.
Originality/value – This research contributes to the literature on robots in tourism and responds to the
call to investigate customers’ attitudes to the adoption of robots in developing countries.
Keywords Robots, Egypt, Hotels, Customer attitudes, Adoption, Travel agencies
Paper type Research paper
摘要
探究消费者对旅游和酒店业采用机器人的态度
研究目的 – 本研究旨在探索影响酒店旅游服务中使用机器人消费者态度的因素
研究设计/方法/途径 – 基于570个酒店和旅行社消费者的数据, 运用结构方程来检测TAM延伸模型
研究发现 – 研究结果显示酒店消费者比旅行社消费者对服务机器人有更加积极的态度
研究原创性/价值 – 本研究对以发展中国家为研究背景, 关于消费者对服务机器人的态度的旅游文献
做出了贡献
关键词 机器人, 采用, 消费者态度, 酒店, 旅行社, 埃及
文章类型： 研究型论文
Introduction
The main use of technologies, including robotics, is to serve and facilitate human social life
(Severinson-Eklundh et al., 2003). According to Breazeal et al. (2016), social robots interact
interpersonally with people to achieve positive outcomes in various aspects of life. The sales
of service robots in service industries, including tourism and hospitality, will probably
increase in the foreseeable future (Belanche et al., 2020). They are used and studied in such
sectors of tourism and hospitality as restaurants (Fusté-Forné, 2021), hotels (Choi et al., 2020;
Vatan and Dogan, 2021; Luo et al., 2021) and travel agencies (Ivanov and Webster, 2019).
Consequently, by 2030 they are predicted to constitute around 25% of the workforce in the
hotel industry (Bowen and Morosan, 2018).
 Academically, the adoption of robots has become a leading emergent research area in Robots in
tourism and hospitality (Park, 2020; Tussyadiah et al., 2020). Ivanov et al. (2020) argued that tourism and
attitudes to robots are important in the tourism demand-side research on them. Thus, many hospitality
studies have investigated their adoption (de Kervenoael et al., 2020), emphasising that
positive customer attitudes are key to their use in tourism (Ivanov et al., 2020). However,
scholars have called for further studies to explore the influencing variables of employing
service robotics in tourism (de Kervenoaelet al., 2020; Tuomi et al., 2020). Tussyadiah (2020) 763
and Hou et al. (2021) have also called for the factors that predict robotics’ acceptance to be
identified. Thus, the aim of the present study is to investigate the factors affecting
customers’ attitudes to the adoption of robots in travel agencies and hotels.
Additionally, most studies on service robots were undertaken in developed countries,
whereas other emergent economies like those of the Middle East are not well explored
(Ivanov et al., 2019): no-one has so far investigated in depth customers’ attitudes to using
robots in tourism in Egypt. The present study proposes to augment knowledge on
customers’ attitudes to robots, highlighting the need, with the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic,
to reduce human contact (Seyitog
lu and Ivanov, 2020; Kim et al., 2021).

Determinants of new technology adoption

The diversity of innovative technologies and their ease of use may inhibit their adoption by
end-users (Hadjia and Degoulet, 2016). the motivation model, the theory of planned behaviour,
theory of diffusion of innovation, social cognitive theory and technology acceptance model
(TAM), all bear on the determinants of accepting and adopting innovations (Lai, 2017).
TAM is a widely used model for explaining users’ attitudes towards new technologies
(Abou-Shouk, 2012; Abou-Shouk and Hewedi, 2016; Sung and Jeon, 2020). According to
TAM, the two dimensions that motivate users to adopt innovations are perceived ease-of-
use (EOU) and usefulness (Davis et al.,1989).

Perceived usefulness
PU implies that individuals tend to use new technologies when they expect it will enable them
to do their jobs better (Davis et al., 1989). In tourism, prior studies conclude that the benefits of
using new technologies positively influence users’ attitude to adoption. Ivanov et al. (2018) and
Çakar and Aykol (2021) explored customers’ attitudes to the prospect of using robots in
accommodation premises. The results showed that the expected benefits significantly improve
customers’ attitudes to the prospect. de Kervenoael et al. (2020) found a correlation between PU
and the perceived value of using robots in hospitality. Likewise, McLean et al. (2020) found that
PU affects customers’ attitudes to online travel shopping. Thus, the first proposition of the
study is stated as:

H1. PU of using robots positively influences customers’ attitude to robot use in tourism
and hospitality.

Perceived ease-of-use
EOU refers to the users’ perception of needing little effort with a particular technology
(Davis et al., 1989), emphasising that EOU increases users’ acceptance of new technologies
(Abou-Shouk et al., 2019). In tourism, Özbek et al. (2015) reported that EOU of online booking
systems positively affects its PU. Furthermore, Bröhl et al. (2019) noted a medium- to high-
level correlation between EOU and customers’ attitudes to human-robot interaction.
JHTT Recently, de Kervenoael et al. (2020) found that robots’ EOU affects their perceived value in
12,4 hospitality. Accordingly, the following hypotheses were developed:

H2. EOU of adopting robots positively affects customers’ attitudes to using robots in
tourism and hospitality.
H3. EOU of adopting robots positively affects the PU of using robots in tourism and
764 hospitality.

General attitude to technology

Tussyadiah et al. (2020) stated that people who have faith in technology in general find it
reliable and helpful. In the prior literature examining customers’ attitudes to technology in
hospitality (i.e. robots), Tussyadiah et al.( 2020) found a positive association between hotel
customers’ positive evaluation of robots’ attributes and intention to use them. Likewise,
Ivanov et al. (2018) revealed that respondents had positive attitudes to robotic applications
in hotels. Hence, we offer two propositions:

H4. General attitudes to technology positively affect customers’ attitudes to adopting

robots in tourism and hospitality.
H5. General attitudes to technology positively affect customers’ PU of adopting robots
in tourism and hospitality.

Customers’ interest in adopting robots

Previous studies found that customers are comfortable with robot service in airports, hotels
and restaurants. Tung and Au (2018) evaluated customers’ experience with robots in hotels
and revealed that guests tried to engage with robots in different ways. Zhong et al. (2020)
found that customers who watched a video about service robots in hotels had stronger
intentions to purchase such hotel services than others. Furthermore, Ivanov et al. (2018)
studied the attitudes of Iranian hotel customers to the introduction of robots, revealing that
respondents are interested in using them. Thus, the present study developed two further
hypotheses:

H6. Customers’ interest in using robots positively affects their attitude to adopting
robots in tourism and hospitality.
H7. Customers’ interest in using robots positively affects their PU of adopting robots in
tourism and hospitality.

Job appropriateness
Job appropriateness (JA) is a significant determinant of PU (Venkatesh and Bala, 2008),
which refers to someone’s certainty that a new system is appropriate for his job (Venkatesh
and Davis, 2000). In tourism, adopting robots may be subject to several factors, such as their
functions and social capacity to undertake their assigned jobs (Beer et al., 2011). Ivanov et al.
(2018) found that customers agree that robots appropriately perform tourism and hospitality
tasks, can provide multi-language information and complete calculations better than
humans. In addition, Ivanov and Webster (2019) demonstrated that customers believe that
robots are more appropriate for information provision, food delivery and housekeeping jobs.
Therefore, customers’ perceptions of robots’ appropriateness to jobs in tourism seems to Robots in
support robots’ PU there. Thus, we hypothesized the following: tourism and
H8. The JA of robots in tourism and hospitality positively affects their usefulness. hospitality

Perceived enjoyment
Perceived enjoyment (PE) refers to the extent to which individuals enjoy using a specific 765
system (Venkatesh and Davis, 2000). In the service robot’s context, Park and delPobil (2013)
indicated that PE contributes much to PEOU and PU of service robots. Recent research also
underscored that PE is a key variable significantly influencing intentions to use robots in
service industries (Han and Conti, 2020). Thus, we hypothesized the following:

H9. PE and perceived EOU positively affect customers’ attitude to using robots.

Category of technology adopter

Technology adopters fall into five categories: innovators, early adopters, early majority, late
majority and laggards (Rogers, 2003). Innovators are the pioneers in this regard. Based on
the Person–Environment Fit Theory, innovative people should feel more satisfied and may
choose to interact with proactive service robots (Babakus et al., 2010).
Furthermore, Kim et al. (2013) established that the acceptance of self-service technology
robots in fast-food restaurants depends on customers’ satisfaction and feelings of
enjoyment. Recently, Belanche et al. (2020) found adopters’ clustering to encourage their
adoption of service robots. Accordingly, we hypothesised that:

H10. The category of technology-adopters positively affects their EOU of robots in

tourism and hospitality.

Research methodology
The present study examines the factors affecting customers’ attitude to using robots in
hotels and travel agencies. A random sample of 570 responses was collected from customers
of 34 Egyptian five-star hotels and 250 category (A) travel agencies based in Cairo. 310
responses came from travel agency customers and 260 from hotel customers. Category (A)
travel agencies are licensed to work in inbound and outbound tourism (Abou-Shouk et al.,
2016; Abou-Shouk, 2018). Five-star hotels receive mostly international guests and are
recognized as innovative luxury hotels with high financial capability. Additionally, the
customers of these hotels are reputedly tech-savvy. Travel agencies are the choice of many
customers seeking information about holidays, destinations, prices and booking procedures,
all information which robots can handle. Hotel customers may receive many robotic services
including checking-in and -out, baggage handling, housekeeping, food delivery and so on.
These two types of customers are different and their attitude to adopting robots may also
differ.

Data collection and analysis

Data were collected between March and May 2019 from customers of hotels and travel
agencies using a questionnaire form. The form was carefully developed for maximum
validity to cover the constructs of the extended TAM based on previous studies and
developed here (Davis et al., 1989; Fuentes-Moraleda et al., 2020).
JHTT The original questionnaire was designed in English then back-translated into Arabic to
12,4 maximise translation validity. The form was available for self-completion in both Arabic
and English versions as hard copy or online, following customers’ preference. For validity’s
sake, the questionnaire was pre-tested by 20 subjects whose data were excluded from the
main study. The questionnaire had 27 indicators developed on a five-point Likert scale to
measure eight main constructs: general attitude to technology adoption (5 items):
766 appropriateness of robots to tourism jobs (3 items); customers’ interest in using robots in
tourism (2 items); perceived usefulness of using robots in tourism (4 items); robots’ ease-of-
use in tourism (3 items); perceived enjoyment of using robots (3 items); technology adopter
clustering (3 items); and attitude to using robots in tourism and hospitality (4 items). PLS-
SEM was used to test the proposed model using WarpPLS software (ver. 7). PLS-SEM is
widely employed in empirical tourism research. It adopts a regression-based SEM technique
which is suitable for testing developed models, as in the present study (Hair et al., 2016).

Findings
Descriptive statistics
The respondents’ demographics (Table 1) suggest that females are dominant respondents
regarding travel agencies (56.2%) while males are regarding hotels (73.1%). Most
respondents about travel agencies are aged 26–35 years, while most respondents about
hotels are between 36 and 45 years. Both categories of respondents (52.8% for travel
agencies and 77.7% for hotels) tend to have had university education. A total of 35.1% of
hotel respondents are Europeans, 3.4% Egyptians, 25.3% Arabs and 9.2% other
nationalities. A total of 47.6% of respondents about travel agencies are Egyptians, 35.3%
Arabs, 13.4% Europeans and 3.7% other nationalities.
Findings revealed that travel agency customers agree that robots can be used to provide
information about offers and packages (mean value = 3.86), responding to customer
enquiries (3.85), marketing activities (3.62), information at airports (3.6), information about
events (3.54) and booking tourist services (3.5). Customers of hotels agree that robots are
appropriate for providing information on offers and events (3.89), booking services (3.88),

Attributes Travel agencies (%) Hotels (%)

Gender
Male 43.8 73.1
Female 56.2 26.9
Age
26–35 51.8 2.2
36–45 27.9 46.7
46–55 14.8 30
More than 55 5.5 3.1
Qualification
High school 42.7 1.5
University 52.8 77.7
Postgraduate 4.5 11.8
Nationality
European 13.4 35.1
Table 1. Arab 35.3 3.4
Profile of Egyptian 47.6 25.3
respondents Other 3.7 9.2
information about hotel services (3.85), handling luggage (3.75), housekeeping (3.55) and Robots in
food and beverage services (3.50). tourism and
hospitality
Measurement models
Looking at Table 2, both measurement models for travel agents and hotels revealed that
convergent validity is evident. Table 3 shows that the square root of AVEs exceeds inter-
constructs correlations and discriminant validity exists (Fornell and Larcker, 1981). 767
Furthermore, the HTMT ratio shows values less than 0.90 and therefore discriminant
validity exists (Table 4) (Kock, 2020). Cronbach’s alpha and composite reliability exceed 0.7
and thus measurements are reliable (Field, 2009). Furthermore, Table 2 shows that all VIFs
for constructs are lower than 3.3 alleviating collinearity concerns (Kock, 2020).

Structural models
As Figure 1 shows, customers’ attitudes to using robots are significantly and positively
affected by the PU of robots for travel agency customers ( b 1 = 0. 20) and hotel customers
( b 2 = 0. 27) (H1 is supported); and the EOU of robots ( b 1 = 0. 22 for travel agency
customers and b 2 = 0. 30 for hotel customers) (H2 is supported). Furthermore, the PU of
robots is positively influenced by EOU ( b 1 = 0. 16 for travel agency customers and b 2 =
0. 17 for hotel customers) (H3 is supported). These findings confirm the traditional results of
TAM that both the PU and EOU of robots positively affect customers’ attitude towards
robots’ adoption.
In addition, the general attitude to technology positively influences customers’ attitude to
adoption ( b 1 = 0. 18 travel agency customers and b 2 = 0. 16 for hotel customers). Hence H4 is
supported. It also affects the PU of robots (b 1 = 0. 13 for travel agency customers and b 2 =
0. 18 for hotel customers), so H5 is supported. These findings mean that when customers have
positive attitudes to technology in general, they have positive attitudes to using robots in
tourism.
Additionally, customers’ interest in using new technologies influencing their attitudes to
adopting robots ( b 1 = 0. 31 for travel agency customers and b 2 = 0. 25 for hotel customers);
H6 is supported. It also affects the PU of robots ( b 1 = 0. 15 for travel agency customers and
b 2 = 0. 21 for hotel customers), supporting H7. These results demonstrate that when
customers are interested in using new technologies, they are more likely to have positive
attitudes to using robots in tourism. These four constructs – PU, EOU, general attitude to
technology and interest in using new technologies – explain 62% of the variance in
customers’ attitudes to adopting robots in travel agencies versus 75% in hotels.
Robots’ appropriateness for jobs of tourism positively affects the PU of robots ( b 1 =
0. 48 for travel agency customers and b 2 = 0. 40 for hotel customers); H8 is supported. The
four constructs – EOU, general attitude to technology, interest in using new technologies
and job appropriateness – explain 68% of the variance in customers’ opinions on the PU of
robots in travel agencies versus 66% in hotels.
In addition, it appears that EOU is positively affected by perceived enjoyment of using
robots ( b 1 = 0. 55 for travel agency customers and b 2 = 0. 48 for hotel customers); H9 is
supported; and technology-adopter level ( b 1 = 0. 32 for travel agency customers and b 2 =
0. 33 for hotel customers); H10 is supported. These two constructs – perceived enjoyment
and technology-adopter level – explain 65% of the variance in customers’ opinions on the
EOU of robots in travel agencies versus 58% in hotels. Table 5 summarises the hypotheses’
testing.
 12,4

768

robots
JHTT

Table 2.

of customers’
attitudes to using
Measurement models
Travel agencies Hotels
Constructs indicators Loading CA CR AVE VIF Loading CA CR AVE VIF

General attitude Technology makes everything work better 0.790 0.850 0.894 0.627 2.2 0.940 0.975 0.980 0.908 2.0
towards technology Technology is very important in life 0.808 0.953
I am comfortable using new technologies 0.863 0.952
I really enjoy using new technologies 0.780 0.962
I am very motivated to use new technologies 0.712 0.958
Perceived usefulness of Robots will respond faster than human employees 0.844 0.891 0.925 0.755 3.2 0.881 0.927 0.948 0.820 3.1
using robots Robots provide more accurate information than humans 0.918 0.949
Robots will provide information in multi-languages 0.898 0.894
Using robots improves job performance compared to humans 0.812 0.898
Easiness-of-using robots I would find it easy to learn using robots in tourism industry 0.864 0.809 0.887 0.724 3.1 0.950 0.954 0.970 0.916 3.2
I would find it easy to interact with robots in tourism 0.872 0.970
It is easy to learn robots’ usage in tourism and hospitality 0.816 0.951
Interest in using Robots I prefer a robot to help me instead of a human 0.902 0.771 0.897 0.814 3.0 0.943 0.876 0.941 0.889 2.9
I would like robots to handle my travel procedures 0.861 0.910
Perceived enjoyment I would find using robots to be enjoyable 0.910 0.888 0.931 0.817 2.9 0.968 0.965 0.977 0.935 3.0
I would find using robots is pleasant 0.923 0.971
I would have fun using robots 0.879 0.962
Appropriateness of Using robots in tourism industry is suitable 0.914 0.889 0.931 0.819 2.8 0.934 0.938 0.960 0.889 2.9
robots Using robots to do tourism tasks is relevant 0.913 0.955
Robots can be used in various tasks in tourism 0.887 0.941
Technology adopter I am willing to experience new innovations 0.884 0.850 0.909 0.770 2.7 0.934 0.924 0.952 0.868 3.1
cluster I would like to be the leader in using new technologies 0.910 0.946
I am not the first neither the last to use new technologies 0.838 0.915
Attitude towards robots’ I have positive feeling towards using robots 0.862 0.898 0.929 0.766 2.8 0.963 0.969 0.977 0.915 3.2
use in tourism it is good to use robots in tourism industry 0.914 0.971
I find it appealing to use robots in tourism 0.853 0.950
It is worth to use robots in tourism 0.870 0.941

Notes: CR: composite reliability, CA: Cronbach’s alpha, AVE: average variance extracted
 General attitude towards Perceived Easiness-of- Interest in using Perceived Appropriateness Technology Attitude towards
Constructs technology usefulness using robots Robots enjoyment of robots adopter cluster robots’ use

General attitude towards technology

A (0.792)
B (0.953)
Perceived usefulness
A 0.641 (0.869)
B 0.592 (0.906)
Easiness-of-using robots
A 0.691 0.712 (0.851)
B 0.577 0.720 (0.957)
Interest in using Robots
A 0.640 0.726 0.746 (0.902)
B 0.541 0.727 0.780 (0.943)
Perceived enjoyment
A 0.607 0.744 0.756 0.819 (0.904)
B 0.592 0.717 0.725 0.790 (0.967)
Appropriateness of robots
A 0.660 0.795 0.745 0.783 0.758 (0.905)
B 0.537 0.756 0.786 0.799 0.833 (0.943)
Technology adopter cluster
A 0.597 0.644 0.706 0.710 0.676 0.813 (0.877)
B 0.620 0.618 0.678 0.650 0.759 0.760 (0.931)
Attitude towards robots’ use
A 0.627 0.692 0.704 0.718 0.731 0.840 0.823 (0.875)
B 0.735 0.763 0.773 0.774 0.846 0.886 0.746 (0.956)

Notes: A: values for travel agencies and B: values for hotels

Square root of AVEs

hospitality

and inter-constructs
Table 3.
Robots in

769

correlations
tourism and
 12,4

770
JHTT

Table 4.
HTMT ratios
General attitude Easiness-of-using Interest in using Perceived Appropriateness Technology adopter
Constructs towards technology Perceived usefulness robots Robots enjoyment of robots cluster

Perceived usefulness
A 0.734
B 0.623
Easiness-of-using robots
A 0.830 0.840
B 0.598 0.766
Interest in using
Robots
A 0.785 0.847 0.845
B 0.586 0.723 0.843
Perceived enjoyment
A 0.694 0.836 0.841 0.849
B 0.610 0.759 0.755 0.846
Appropriateness of robots
A 0.754 0.845 0.846 0.882 0.842
B 0.561 0.811 0.832 0.841 0.847
Technology adopter cluster
A 0.698 0.740 0.849 0.847 0.777 0.835
B 0.652 0.668 0.723 0.843 0.804 0.817
Attitude towards robots’ use
A 0.717 0.772 0.826 0.844 0.818 0.840 0.841
B 0.645 0.806 0.804 0.840 0.844 0.429 0.788

Notes: A: values for travel agencies and B: values for hotels

 Robots in
Interest in tourism and
using robots
in tourism
hospitality
General
β1 = 0.18**
attitude
toward β2 = 0.16*
β1 = 0.15* β1 = 0.31
technology
β2 = 0.21** 771
β1 = 0.13*
** R 12 = 0.62
β2 = 0.25 R 22 = 0.75
β2 = 0.18*
**
Appropria- Perceived Attitude
β1= .48** usefulness β1 = 0.20** towards
teness of
robots to β2=.40** of using β2 = 0.27** robot’s
tourism jobs robots usage
R 12 = 0.69
R 22 = 0.66
β1 = 0.22*
β1 = 0.16* *
Perceived
enjoyment β 2 = 0.17* β2 = 0.30*
of using *
robots β1 = 0.55**
β2 = 0.48** Perceived
easiness of
β1 = 0.32** using robots Note: Figure 1.
Category of Structural models of
technology β2 = 0.33** β1, R12 are for travel agencies
β2, R22 are for hotels customers’ attitudes
Adopter
R 12 = 0.65 ** significant at 1% to adopting robots in
R 22 = 0.58 * Significant at 5% tourism

No. Hypotheses Travel agencies Hotels Result

H1 Usefulness – Attitude 0.20** 0.27** S

H2 Ease-of-use – Attitude 0.22** 0.30** S
H3 Ease-of-use – Usefulness 0.16* 0.17* S
H4 General attitude – Attitude 0.18** 0.16* S
H5 General attitude – Usefulness 0.13* 0.18* S
H6 Robots’ interest – Attitude 0.31** 0.25** S
H7 Robots’ interest – Usefulness 0.15* 0.21** S
H8 Appropriateness – Usefulness 0.48** 0.40** S
H9 Enjoyment – Ease-of-use 0.55** 0.48** S
H10 Adopter category– Ease-of-use 0.32** 0.33** S Table 5.
Testing the
Notes: * Significant at 5%, ** significant at 1%, S Supported hypotheses
JHTT Discussion of findings
12,4 The current study aims to measure the factors influencing the use of robots in tourism and
hospitality. The findings suggest that robots can provide information in hotels, travel
agencies and airports. Some hotels could replace their receptionists by robots or at least use
them to assist traditional desk clerks. Robots handling luggage in hotels and airports and
performing housekeeping services are evidence of their value for travel, tourism and
772 hospitality.
The current threat of COVID19 is urging service providers to adopt social robots for
safety reasons (Seyitog
lu and Ivanov, 2020; Kim et al., 2021). This study treats robots as
social media interacting with customers. Robots are found in different forms in the industry,
for example, providing information through smart systems, answering customers’ queries
and other advanced tasks.
The findings revealed that most of the respondents classified themselves as early
adopters of new technologies, who were willing to experience new ideas and innovations.
This classification interprets the positive relationship between robots’ ease-of-use and
customers’ positive attitudes to adoption. These finding echoes Belanche et al. (2020) and the
similar results of Babakus et al. (2010) that innovative people feel more satisfied in using
robots.
Furthermore, the EOU positively affects PU. de Kervenoael et al. (2020) found that robots’
ease-of-use influences its perceived value in tourism. Customers of hotels and travel agencies
believe that robots’ response to tasks is faster and more accurate than humans and can be
multi-lingual. This finding is supported by Ivanov et al. (2018), de Kervenoael et al. (2020)
and McLean et al. (2020), who found significant links between PU and customers’ attitudes
to adopting robots in tourism.
As well as traditional predictors (PU and EOU) of attitudes to technology, the present
study tested the effect of two further constructs, customers’ general attitude to technology
and their interest in using robots in tourism, on their attitudes to adopting robots. The
findings revealed that customers who generally accepted the importance of technology in
life, feel comfortable with it and enjoy using new technology (here, robots) more probably
have positive attitudes to using robots in tourism and hospitality. This finding is in line with
Tussyadiah et al. (2020), who found that individuals’ faith in technology determines their
attitude to adopting it. Similarly, Ivanov et al. (2018) found that customers’ general attitude
to robots predicts their positive attitude to its use in tourism. In addition, the more interest
customers have in using new technologies, the more positive their attitude to adopting them.
This finding is confirmed by Ivanov et al. (2018), Ivanov and Webster (2019) and Zhong et al.
(2020).

Conclusion and research implications

Conclusion
To explore customers’ attitudes to adopting robots in tourism and hospitality, the current
study examined the predictors of their attitude based on the extended TAM developed in
this study. Findings revealed that hotel customers are more likely to adopt robots than are
travel agency customers. Customers’ general attitude to technology, customers’ interest in
using robots, perceived usefulness and robots’ ease-of-use are significant predictors of
customers’ attitudes to adopting service robots in travel agencies and hotels. Findings
revealed that robots can do various jobs in tourism and hospitality including information
provision, welcoming guests, guiding customers in tourism sites, museums, tourism events,
and managing luggage in airports, and booking services.
Theoretical implications Robots in
Theoretically, this study supplies the needed research on adopting robots in tourism and tourism and
hospitality. It investigates customers’ attitudes in emergent economies, such as the Middle
East, which demand investigation; most research on service robots has concerned developed
hospitality
countries (Ivanov et al., 2018). Specifically, no in-depth study had yet emerged on customers’
attitudes to using robots in hospitality and tourism in Egypt. Thus, the findings of the present
study extend the previous knowledge about customers’ intentions to adopt service robots in
this sector. This study responds to the claims of Tussyadiah (2020) and de Kervenoael et al. 773
(2020) that it is most urgent to investigate what drives service businesses to use intelligent
automation in tourism, where a main driver is customers’ attitudes to technology acceptance.
Therefore, the present study will help service providers to understand customers’ attitudes to
adopting robots, particularly since the pandemic began, when protective measures to safeguard
customers have been needed.
In addition, it contributes to methodology by extending, validating and testing TAM to
better understand the factors influencing customers’ acceptance of robots in tourism and
hospitality. Based on the literature, the authors added two new constructs to the traditional
TAM: customers’ general attitude to technology and customers’ interest in using robots. It
was found that these constructs clarified customers’ attitudes to adopting robots in travel
agencies and hotels.
It also revealed that robots are appropriate for tourism and hospitality jobs and that
customer’s technological skills and levels of enjoyment indirect predict their attitudes to
using robots in tourism and hospitality. Scholars are encouraged to use the extended model
to reveal global evidence on customers’ attitude to adopting robots in this industry.
Furthermore, this study provided a research model that can be tested and validated in
different sectors of tourism and hospitality (restaurants, airports, events [. . .] etc).

Practical implications
The managerial implications of the study form an important step in understanding the
attitudes of travel agency and hotel customers to using service robots. Robots can be
employed by travel and tourism service providers in many different jobs, providing
information and answering customers’ questions, welcoming and guiding customers in
tourism sites, museums, meetings, events and doing hotels’ jobs, managing luggage in
airports and booking services (Ivanov et al., 2019). For safety considerations, customers
would rather deal with robots, given COVID-19’s effect on tourism. To quickly recover,
service providers could serve their customers and improve their experience using robots.
However, managers should assuage customers’ concerns over confidential personal data.
Managers should introduce robots to customers by encouraging the use of automated
services (i.e. chatbots, etc). when applicable. Robots should be designed with multi-language
functions to enable customers to use and interact easily with robots in their preferred
language. In addition, since the consumers’ attitudes towards service robots are positive
and may drive their future use, hotels and travel agents’ managers should consider the
available facilitating conditions and sources required to adopt service robots in the future.
This underlines the amount of undertaking costs, such as capital and labour related costs, to
be invested in technology and robotics in different tourism and hospitality sectors. The
findings of the study will also help managers of travel agencies and hotels to identify the
potential barriers and benefits of adopting robotics by their business.
JHTT Limitations and future research
12,4 This research has several limitations. First, it looks at customers’ attitude to adoption, not
the actual adoption of robots. This is because emerging economies still adopt few service
robots in tourism and hospitality. Trust is another factor that should be investigated in
future studies. This study is limited to travel agency and hotel customers; therefore, the
research model should certainly be validated in other sectors of tourism, such as museums,
774 archaeological sites, and events. In addition, using qualitative and experimental research designs,
researchers should also investigate managers’/employees’ attitude and usage intention, barriers to
the adoption of services robots in tourism and hospitality different sectors in developing economics.

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Corresponding author
Mohamed Abou-Shouk can be contacted at: maboushouk@sharjah.ac.ae

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