After a long day of navigating noisy airports and congested highways, an exhausted traveler enters a hotel room with expectations of peace and comfort.

Then, an unexpected voice greets the guest, and it doesn’t belong to a person.

No, this isn’t the beginning of a fantastical ghost story. As hotels implement artificial intelligence-powered technologies such as voice assistants, the aforementioned scene is a growing reality. While some guests welcome the convenience of these in-room innovations, others have the unsettling feeling that the devices are intruding upon privacy.

Abraham Terrah, a Spears School of Business Ph.D. student, can offer insights into the novel appeal and ethical issues surrounding the use of AI in hospitality and tourism. From Alexa-like voice assistants to facial recognition-activated room keys to robot bartenders, Terrah realizes AI is inevitably shaping the industry’s future. His research explores ways these innovations can enhance hotelier and customer experiences while easing concerns.

Terrah, who grew up primarily in the West African nation of Burkina Faso, often played with computer games and popular gadgets as a curious kid. But he didn’t develop his tech-focused research niche until the COVID-19 pandemic hit while he was pursuing his master’s degree in hospitality management at the University of South Florida. Although it was a difficult time to study and work in hospitality, he noticed how AI powered the contactless services that allowed a floundering industry to bounce back.

“It was like watching the future arrive early,” Terrah said. “Definitely, that was my spark. I realized that yes, if AI can help the whole industry survive this crisis that was the pandemic, maybe it can help us thrive in the future.”

Terrah wrote his master’s thesis on factors that drive hotel guests to use AI technologies, using the cutting-edge Flyzoo Hotel in China as an example. His paper, titled “Determinants of users’ intentions to use AI enabled technological innovations in hotel settings: A hybrid approach using PLS-SEM and fsQCA,” received publication this year inAdvances in Hospitality and Tourism Research.

In this study, Terrah identified novelty and lifestyle compatibility as key factors that draw people toward AI innovations, impacting customer perceptions of usefulness and ease of use. However, his findings indicate a technology doesn’t need to be particularly useful for a guest to want to engage with it.

People are curious about AI. If they’re prompting ChatGPT to write silly skits or asking Google Gemini to create absurd images, then they might also want to tinker with the latest technologies in hotels simply because they’re new and fun.

“Usually, the traditional view will say for any technology, its usefulness — what is the utilitarian benefit? — is going to drive adoption,” Terrah said. “But it appears that in a hospitality setting like a hotel, the experience element can override the practical functionality for some user groups.”

Since his initial AI research at USF, Terrah has delved deeper into this field at OSU as a business administration doctoral student with a hospitality and tourism management option. OSU’s School of Hospitality and Tourism Management introduces students to technologies that include robots and big data analytics.

Read the full article at School of Hospitality and Tourism Management at Oklahoma State University