In his paper „Love Dolls and Sex Robots in Unproven and Unexplored Fields of Application“, published in Paladyn, Journal of Behavioral Robotics, Oliver Bendel of the FHNW School of Business discussed prisons as one of several potential application areas for such products. In 2024, his student Tamara Siegmann proposed exploring the use of collaborative and social robots in correctional facilities, focusing on whether they could and should be deployed in such environments. Together with Oliver Bendel, she wrote the paper „Social and Collaborative Robots in Prison“ for the International Conference on Social Robotics (ICSR) in Odense, which was published in the 2025 Springer ICSR proceedings. This work subsequently inspired Jean Paul Smit of Delft University of Technology and his co-authors to write the paper „Social Robot Supporting Visitor Mood and Staff Situation Awareness in a Security Waiting Room“, which he presented at ICSR + Art 2026 in London. The paper describes the development and evaluation of a social robot designed to improve visitors‘ emotional well-being in security waiting rooms while supporting staff through enhanced situation awareness. In 2025, Tamara Siegmann submitted a proposal to a Swiss funding organization based on the prison robotics research. As part of the initiative, inmates at a Swiss correctional facility will receive access to an offline chatbot serving as a companion. The chatbot was developed by Stephan Vonschallen with feedback from Tamara Siegmann and Oliver Bendel, and the project has now entered its main implementation phase. At ICSR + Art 2026, several researchers expressed strong interest in the prison-related projects, suggesting that this promising area of research is likely to receive growing attention in the years ahead.

Fig.: Jean Paul Smit, Stephan Vonschallen, and Oliver Bendel at ICSR 2026