An Empirical Study of Older Adult’s Voice Assistant Use for Health Information Seeking

Abstract

Although voice assistants are increasingly being adopted by older adults, we lack empirical research on how they interact with these devices for health information seeking. Also, prior work shows how voice assistant responses can provide misleading or inaccurate information and be harmful particularly in health contexts. Because of increased health needs while aging, this paper studies older adult’s (ages 65+) health-related voice assistant interactions. Motivated by a lack of empirical evidence for how older adults approach information seeking with emerging technologies, we first conducted a survey of n = 201 older adults to understand how they engage voice assistants compared to a range of offline and digital sources for health information seeking. Findings show how voice assistants were used for confirmatory health queries, with users showing signs of distrust. As much prior work focuses on perceptions of voice assistant use, we conducted scenario-based interviews with n = 35 older adults to study health-related voice assistant behavior. In interviews, participants engaged with different health topics (flu, migraine, high blood pressure) and scenario types (symptom-driven, behavior-driven) using a voice assistant. Findings show how conversational and human-like expectations with voice assistants lead to information breakdowns between the older adult and voice assistant. This paper contributes a nuanced query-level analysis of older adults’ voice-based health information seeking behaviors. Further, data provide evidence for how query reformulation happens with complex topics in voice-based information seeking. We use our findings to discuss how voice interfaces can better support older adults’ health information seeking behaviors and expectations.

Privacy concerns of older adults using voice assistant systems

“…VAS present opportunities for older adults to increase interactions with their environment, improve home safety, participate in remote monitoring, and optimize medication adherence and may be underutilized. 1 In a recent study, VAS ownership and use in older adults (>60 years) was similar to that of younger adults (18-60 years). 2 Yet, less is known about older adults' VAS related privacy concerns or their understanding of VAS-specific privacy risks (e.g., VASinitiated interactions) which are important factors that may limit VAS use for health monitoring.…”

“…Voice assistant systems (VAS) are software platforms that complete various tasks using voice commands (e.g., Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant). VAS present opportunities for older adults to increase interactions with their environment, improve home safety, participate in remote monitoring, and optimize medication adherence and may be underutilized 1 . In a recent study, VAS ownership and use in older adults (>60 years) was similar to that of younger adults (18–60 years) 2 .…”

“…In a recent study, VAS ownership and use in older adults (>60 years) was similar to that of younger adults (18–60 years) 2 . Yet, less is known about older adults' VAS related privacy concerns or their understanding of VAS‐specific privacy risks (e.g., VAS‐initiated interactions) which are important factors that may limit VAS use for health monitoring 1,3 . It is necessary to understand the juxtaposition of younger and older adults' VAS privacy concerns as younger adults may have different concerns impacting VAS acceptance.…”

Examining the context‐specific reasons and adoption of artificial intelligence‐based voice assistants: A behavioural reasoning theory approach

“…AI-powered voice assistants are gaining popularity and are anticipated to alter how users interact with technology (Oliveira et al, 2023). These technologies can be used for online shopping, answering queries in a human-like manner, controlling other compatible devices, finding health information and much more (Brewer et al, 2022;Kautish et al, 2023;Tulshan & Dhage, 2019).AI-based voice assistants, which are popular technologies, can learn from user engagement and provide the best possible service (Kendall et al, 2020). Researchers have studied the adoption of AI-based technologies in various contexts, including travel service agents (Lalicic & Weismayer, 2021), autonomous vehicles (Youlin & Qian, 2021), and customer engagement through augmented reality (McLean & Wilson, 2019).…”

“…AI‐powered voice assistants are gaining popularity and are anticipated to alter how users interact with technology (Oliveira et al, 2023). These technologies can be used for online shopping, answering queries in a human‐like manner, controlling other compatible devices, finding health information and much more (Brewer et al, 2022; Kautish et al, 2023; Tulshan & Dhage, 2019). AI‐based voice assistants, which are popular technologies, can learn from user engagement and provide the best possible service (Kendall et al, 2020).…”