I am old too!: Understanding the Impact of Empathy and Voice Characteristics on Older Adults' Perception of Voice Assistants

Despite improvements in the universal usability of digital technologies and growing numbers of conversational agents (CAs), new technologies rarely reflect older adults' needs, perceptions, and interests. Following this urgent call, we aim to identify older adults' (ranging in age from 65 to 75) perceptions, needs and challenges when conversing with a smart speaker-based voice assistant (Google Home) about the Covid-19 pandemic during the first-time user interaction. Based on CASA (Computers are Social Actors) Paradigm and Similarity Attraction Theory, our user-centered qualitative research showed that an emphatic voice assistant triggered older adults to disclose to a CA more than a human being and build a digital companionship with them. Going beyond the standard universal usability considerations, we revealed how their cultural biases, beliefs and ageing stereotypes affected their perception of the voice assistant. However, the similarity attraction effect is not activated in older adults since a voice assistant with an older voice was not perceived as close or similar to them and they perceived technology as a young tool to be adapted. Unexpectedly, the older is wiser stereotype has been deactivated in a technological context for older adults in Turkey.