Cleaning with Dustin Bieber: Nicknaming Autonomous Products and the Evolving Relationship with New Technologies

• Main Authors: Zimmermann, Jenny Lena, De bellis, Emanuel, Hofstetter, Reto, Puntoni, Stefano
• Format: Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Subjects: Consumers; Technology
• ISSN: 0098-9258

Advances in artificial intelligence and robotics permit today's products to become increasingly autonomous, taking over various consumer tasks and making decisions on their own. The rise of these autonomous products (APs) has translated into new forms of relationships. Products are seen as collaborators complementing human skills, as competitors substituting human skills, or as coopetitors combining both aspects. Since APs possess human-like characteristics, the desire to personify and personalize them evokes more easily compared to conventional products. One way this manifests is by the increased use of nicknames for APs. Consumers discuss online what nickname to choose for their new device (SmarmysPiza 2019) and verbally integrate APs into their social lives by referring to them by their nickname. An analysis of consumer-created Tweets shows that whereas only 1% of Tweets include a nickname for traditional vacuum cleaners, 12% do so for robotic ones. On the company side, several firms such as Husqvarna and iRobot already support the use of nicknames for APs. They highlight nicknames in their communication and provide an option to assign a nickname in their mobile applications. Despite these unequivocal trends, it is unclear how nicknaming influences consumers' perception and use of APs. Drawing on consumer behavior literature on APs, psychology literature on nicknames in a social context, and findings from organizational management research on coopetition, we propose that, in specific consumer-product relationships giving a nickname can help to regain control over autonomous products, which in turn increases their evaluation. Our theorizing is based on social response theory assuming that people spontaneously apply the same social heuristics used for human interactions to technologies because they possess similar social characteristics (Nass and Moon 2000; Nass et al. 1995). Based on Zhang and Patrick's (2018) definition of brand nicknames, we conceptualize product nicknames as consumer-created substitutes for formal product names, such as "Dustin Bieber" for a robotic vacuum cleaner (Mirani 2020). Psychology literature on nicknames in interpersonal relationships finds that nicknames can emphasize individuality or belonging to a group (Bruess and Pearson 1993). Thus, we expect that the use of nicknames (vs. no nicknames) leads to higher evaluations of APs. As, in social contexts, close relationships are associated with mitigated uncertainties and percept