Impact of socially assistive robots in nursing care of the elderly

There has been an increase in the use of technology to provide a high level of care for the elderly. Constraints in the human resources availability and the development in artificial intelligence and robotics has led to the evolution of Socially Assistive Robots that provide the elderly with both social and assistive functions. The reception of the technology by the elderly, often without the technological knowhow of the newer generations, is something that needs to be investigated. The aim of the study was to examine how the elderly experience the involvement of socially assistive robots in their care. Furthermore, the aim was to provide in- formation to help better integrate the socially assistive robots into the lives of the elderly. The literature review was conducted by the formulation and refinement of the research question. The search strategy was devised with identification of keywords and the databases and developing the inclusion/exclusion criteria. The selected articles were then subsequently read, analysed, and encoded to form the basis for results. The results from the study showed that the elderly mostly perceived the socially assistive robots positively. They were viewed as a friend or companion that enables them to do tasks that they have been limited from due to lowered functional capacities. The elderly also enjoyed the various features and the social and communication skills of the socially assistive robots. But they also felt that there was a lot of room for improvement in the technology and its implementation as well as the fact that they were not a human replacement but rather a tool to complement the actual human