Ah, Alright, Okay! Communicating Understanding in Conversational Product Search

Andrea Papenmeier, Elin Anna Topp

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contributionAcademicpeer-review

2 Citations (Scopus)
65 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

When talking about products, people often express their needs in vague terms with vocabulary that does not necessarily overlap with product descriptions written by retailers. This poses a problem for chatbots in online shops, as the vagueness and vocabulary mismatch can lead to misunderstandings. In human-human communication, people intuitively build a common understanding throughout a conversation, e.g., via feedback loops. To inform the design of conversational product search systems, we investigated the effect of different feedback behaviors on users’ perception of a chatbot’s competence and conversational engagement. Our results show that rephrasing the user’s input to express what was understood increases conversational engagement and gives the impression of a competent chatbot. Using a generic feedback acknowledgment (e.g., “right” or “okay”), however, does not increase engagement or perceived competence. Auto-feedback for conversational product search systems therefore needs to be designed with care.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationCUI '23
Subtitle of host publicationProceedings of the 5th International Conference on Conversational User Interfaces
EditorsMinha Lee, Cosmin Munteanu, Martin Porcheron, Johanne Trippas, Sarah Theres Völkel
PublisherAssociation for Computing Machinery
Number of pages5
ISBN (Electronic)979-8-4007-0014-9
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 19 Jul 2023
Event5th International Conference on Conversational User Interfaces, CUI 2023 - Eindhoven, Netherlands
Duration: 19 Jul 202321 Jul 2023
Conference number: 5

Conference

Conference5th International Conference on Conversational User Interfaces, CUI 2023
Abbreviated titleCUI 2023
Country/TerritoryNetherlands
CityEindhoven
Period19/07/2321/07/23

Keywords

  • 2024 OA procedure

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Ah, Alright, Okay! Communicating Understanding in Conversational Product Search'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this