Designing for Autonomous Motivation: Qualitative Interview Study on Pre-Enrollment Preferences of Survivors of Cancer for Digital Health Behavior Change Programs.

Assistive robots are increasingly positioned within the broader category of service assistive robots. Service assistive robots are commonly defined as assistive robots for personal or professional use that perform useful tasks for humans or equipment, excluding industrial automation applications []. In health care, assistive robots have been applied in multiple areas, including rehabilitation, patient mobility support, logistics, medication or supply delivery, socially assistive companionship, monitoring, and patient-facing support functions [-]. Interest in assistive robots has grown in response to workforce shortages, aging populations, infection-control demands, and pressure to improve productivity in health care systems [-]. Developments in sensor technology, AI, autonomous navigation, and human-robot interaction have expanded the potential functions of assistive robots beyond fixed repetitive tasks toward more adaptive forms of clinical and social support [-]. These capabilities not only make assistive robots potentially useful in care environments but also raise questions about safety, accountability, workflow integration, and the boundaries of human-centered care [,,]. During the COVID-19 pandemic, socially assistive robots were deployed in some care settings to support symptom screening and exposure assessment, illustrating one way assistive robots were used to reduce infection-related contact while maintaining service delivery [,]. However, pandemic-related deployments also highlighted that assistive robots must be evaluated not only for technical feasibility but also for acceptability, workflow fit, and their effects on human interaction [,].