Service robots are taking over the frontline. They can possess three types of artificial intelligence (AI): mechanical, thinking, and feeling AI. Although these intelligences determine how service robots can help customers, not much is known about how customers respond to robots of different intelligence. This paper addresses this gap, builds on the appraisal theory of emotions, and employs three online experiments and one field study to demonstrate that customers have different emotional responses to the three types of AI. Particularly, the influence of AI on positive emotions becomes stronger as the AI type becomes more sophisticated. That is, feeling AI relates more strongly to positive emotions than mechanical AI. Also, feeling AI and thinking AI increase spending and loyalty intention through customers’ positive emotions. We also identify important contingency effects of service tiers: mechanical AI is more suitable for low-cost firms, whereas feeling AI mainly benefits full-service providers. Remarkably, none of the three intelligences are directly related to negative emotions; perceived robot autonomy is an important mediator in these relationships. The findings yield concrete managerial guidance as to how smart a service robot should be by pinpointing the right type of AI given the market segment of the service provider.

服务机器人正在接管前线。他们可以拥有三种类型的人工智能（AI）：机械、思维和感觉人工智能。尽管这些智能决定了服务机器人如何帮助客户，但对于客户如何响应不同智能的机器人知之甚少。本文解决了这一差距，建立在情绪评估理论的基础上，并采用三个在线实验和一个实地研究来证明客户对三种类型的人工智能有不同的情绪反应。特别是，随着 AI 类型变得越来越复杂，AI 对积极情绪的影响也越来越大。也就是说，感觉 AI 与积极情绪的关系比机械 AI 更强烈。此外，感觉 AI 和思考 AI 通过客户的积极情绪增加消费和忠诚度。我们还确定了服务层级的重要权变效应：机械 AI 更适合低成本公司，而感觉 AI 主要有利于全方位服务提供商。值得注意的是，这三种智能都与负面情绪没有直接关系。感知到的机器人自主性是这些关系中的重要中介。根据服务提供商的细分市场，通过查明正确的人工智能类型，研究结果为服务机器人的智能程度提供了具体的管理指导。