Human vs. robot service provider agents in service failures: comparing customer dissatisfaction and the mediating role of forgiveness and service recovery expectation

Abstract This study employs a 3 × 2 between-subject experimental design to investigate customer responses to hotel service failures attributed to different service provider agents (SPAs) [humans, humanoid robots, non-humanoid robots] in two types of service failure contexts [process and outcome]. It focuses on customers’ initial psychological response [forgiveness], subsequent action-seeking behavior [service recovery expectation (SRE)], and overall outcome evaluation [dissatisfaction]. Hypotheses are grounded in Mind Perception Theory, Attribution Theory, and Expectancy Disconfirmation Theory. A two-way ANCOVA was used to compare mean scores across the dependent variables. The findings reveal that increased SPA humanness diminishes customers’ forgiveness, elevates SRE, and intensifies dissatisfaction, with these differences occurring only in process failures and not in outcome failures. Subsequently, a serial mediation analysis for process failures indicated that forgiveness and SRE serially mediate the positive relationship between SPAs’ humanness and customer dissatisfaction.