Investigating User Preferences for Conversation Design of Voice Assistant Systems using Linguistic Features

Abstract

As the use of voice assistant (VA) systems is increasing, conversation design in the system is important for effective human-system interaction. The objective of the study was to investigate the level of user preference for VA outputs in terms of linguistics. Answers of three VA systems for each of the nine questions were collected and categorized for distinctive linguistic factors such as type of theme, thematic progression, number of predications, and ellipsis. The VA answers were evaluated through an online survey. Results show that linguistic factors and features significantly affect user preference for VA outputs. The results imply that the linguistic features need to be considered for designing voice interaction communications as a natural interaction method.