Understanding Social Engagement in Voice-User Interfaces: An Exploratory Study of Embodiment and Gestures

Human-robot interaction (HRI) researchers have been researching the social robot designs which intrigue engagement among users. Previous work has been mainly focused on the appearance of robots for user engagement. With voice being one of the common methods for interaction, it is important to understand how different embodiment and social cues can intrigue the engagement in voice-based interaction. This paper reports the controlled-lab study with 36 participants who completed an interactive session involving humanoid robot and voice user interface (VUI). Participants were randomly assigned to interact with one of three research conditions. We hypothesized that participants who interacted with social robot embedded with VUI and gestures would highly engage in the communication. However, the actual results indicate that voice-based interaction intrigued engagement among participants regardless of the embodiment. The findings suggest that the robot’s ability to have an interpersonal and natural conversation has stronger impacts on social engagement.