Socially assistive robots have the potential to help healthcare professionals take care of patients facing different diseases, including cancer, but their uptake is relatively slow. In this short narrative review, we summarize the existing research on factors that are associated with the acceptance of social robots in healthcare (and beyond) and present evidence for the important role of perceived usefulness, perceived enjoyment, and trust. We then use this knowledge to propose an acceptance-oriented methodological framework for implementing social robots in oncological settings.

This research project is partially funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, project HosmartAI (grant agreement No. 101016834) This work was partially funded by the Slovenian Research Agency (ARRS) project 'Empowerment of ageing individuals: Self-regulatory mechanisms and support of digital technology in achieving higher quality of life' (grant agreement No. J5-3120)