Drone Fail Me Now: How Drone Failures Affect Trust and Risk-Taking Decisions

So far, research on drone failures has been mostly limited to understanding the technical causes of failures and recovery strategies. In contrast, there is little work looking at how failures of drones are perceived by users. To address this gap, we conduct a real-world study where participants experience drone failures leading to monetary loss whilst navigating a drone over an obstacle course. We tested 46 participants where they experienced both a failure and failure-free (control) interaction. Participants' trust in the drone, their enjoyment of the interaction, perceived control, and future use intentions were all negatively impacted by drone failures. However, risk-taking decisions during the interaction were not affected. These findings suggest that experiencing a failure whilst operating a drone in real-time is detrimental to participants' subjective experience of the interaction.