Therapeutic Robots for Older Adults: Investigating the Potential of Paro

As the population ages, there is an increasing need for socioemotional support for older adults. Therapeutic pets have been used to meet this need, but there are limitations in the practicality of placing pets in older adults' living environments. More recently therapeutic robots have been proposed as a solution. However, there is limited research on the efficacy of deploying therapeutic robots to provide socio-emotional support to older adults. This study investigates the potential of the Paro robot seal to support older adults' needs while avoiding some of the limitations of current pet therapy approaches. Our results will provide insight about how robots can be designed and deployed to increase therapeutic efficacy.