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Elements of good conversation
User research on the differences between human-human and human-agent communication
What makes conversation good?
It’s important to keep this question in mind when designing for voice assistants like Google Home, Alexa, Siri, and Cortana. Design heuristics for voice interaction recommend having a match between the system and the real world. This entails learning from how people would normally communicate with each other and applying the extracted insights to design.
To list the qualities of good conversation, Clark and colleagues conducted user research by interviewing people about their views on human-human and human-agent communication. Inductive thematic analysis reveals four attributes that are essential to good conversations. Researchers also reiterate one key difference when interacting with virtual agents, thus prompting a call for a shift in mindset from designing conversations to designing transactions.
Transactional versus social
There are two types of conversation according to purpose — transactional and social. Transactional conversations have a practical goal, say ordering food at a restaurant or handing over work to a colleague. Conversationalists have their own goals in the interaction; success is achieved…
