Sometimes, an interaction with a robot may frighten a child. It may move someone to tears or even lead to an attachment that makes the end of a study difficult. These moments can shape participants’ experiences and researchers’ decisions, yet often go unrecorded in published accounts. The paper “Emotional Entanglements and Emotional Sustainability in HRI,” led by LASIGE researcher Hugo Simão, draws on self-reports from 11 researchers across 15 robot deployments. The authors examine what happens when unexpected emotions arise before, during, and after a study, including distress, uncertainty about researchers’ responsibilities, and the difficulty of removing a robot to which participants have become attached. The paper offers a shared vocabulary and a preliminary checklist to help research teams anticipate, respond to, and report these situations. By making them visible, the authors hope that future studies can learn from what happens in the field and better support both participants and researchers.

Co-authored by Long-Jing Hsu, Bengisu Çağıltay, Isabel Neto, Christopher D. Wallbridge, Laura Santos, Filipa Rocha, Leigh Levinson, João Silva Sequeira, Tiago Guerreiro, and Patricia Alves-Oliveira, the paper was presented at HRI 2026, in March 12-16 2026, Edinburgh, Scotland. Read the paper here.