Robot Chefs as Both a Threat and an Experience: The Roles of Anthropomorphism, Job Insecurity, and Culinary Students’ Experience Intentions

The rapid proliferation of service robots and artificial intelligence is reshaping tourism sector jobs and redefining future workforce expectations. Regarding robot chefs, research has largely investigated the perceptions of customers and existing employees rather than those of emerging hospitality professionals. Accordingly, this study draws on the anthropomorphism framework to examine how culinary students’ perceptions of robot chefs affect experience intention and willingness to pay a premium, negative attitudes, and perceived job insecurity. Data were collected from university students studying gastronomy to test the hypotheses using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). The findings showed that robot chef anthropomorphism directly and positively affects experience intention and reduces negative attitudes toward robots. Perceived innovation directly strengthens experience intention, while perceived job insecurity increases negative attitudes. Negative attitudes toward robots do not significantly affect experience intention, suggesting that students remain open to interacting with robot chefs in terms of their professional learning motivation and future job roles. Finally, experience intention strongly predicts greater willingness to pay a premium. These findings contribute to the relevant literature by indicating that robot chefs should be positioned in culinary education not only as a technological innovation but as an element creating experience-based value.