"Learn, Use, and (Intermittently) Abandon": Exploring the Practices of Early Smart Speaker Adopters in Urban India
Abstract
Since smart speakers were introduced to the Indian markets at the end of 2017, they have been adopted by hundreds of thousands households in India. While the scholarship has examined the long-term use of voice-based devices in western contexts, little is known about user behavior in India -- one of the fastest-growing smart speaker markets in the Asian Pacific region. Therefore, this study aims to explore how members families in India integrate Google Home into their daily lives. To this end, we collected long-term Google Home activity logs from 20 households and conducted interviews with one member from each generation in every household. Our findings shed light on the unique daily use patterns of adults and children, the users' approaches to, and challenges in learning to use, the devices, and factors that impact users' continued use or abandonment of the devices. We conclude the paper by discussing the implications of our findings and by proposing relevant design recommendations.
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Prior research on code-switching with voice-controlled assistants has observed users' need to code-switch as the most prominent theme.
“This research has engaged with primarily non-White, educated, affluent, or STEM-educated technology users and has observed users’ need to code-switch as being the most prominent theme, which is considered switching between multiple languages, when interacting with smart devices that employ automated voice responses [35, 52].”
From "It's Kind of Like Code-Switching": Black Older Adults' Experiences with a Voice Assistant for Health Information Seeking (2022) · cites this paper as [35]
Prior research on cultural reception of speech recognition has primarily studied communities who consider English as their second language.
“an area which up until this point has primarily been studied in HCI among communities who consider English as their second language (e.g., [35, 52]).”
From "It's Kind of Like Code-Switching": Black Older Adults' Experiences with a Voice Assistant for Health Information Seeking (2022) · cites this paper as [35]
Prior work has shown the benefit of conversational devices such as Alexa or Google Home in non-native English speakers practicing English, although for some groups, such as urban Indians who often code-mix while engaging in human-to-human conversations, using voice assistants present unique struggles.
“Prior work has shown the benefit of conversational devices such as Alexa or Google Home in non-native English speakers practicing English [26, 35, 51], although for some groups, such as urban Indians who often code-mix while engaging in human-to-human conversations, using voice assistants present unique struggles [35].”
From "It's Kind of Like Code-Switching": Black Older Adults' Experiences with a Voice Assistant for Health Information Seeking (2022) · cites this paper as [35]
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Communication Breakdowns Between Families and Alexa
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BackgroundInfluentialUse of Intelligent Voice Assistants by Older Adults with Low Technology Use
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“Prior work in the western context has found that voice-based interactions on phones and smart speakers have a democratizing effect, as family members can interact with the devices without needing an invitation [6, 66].”
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Harrington, C. N., Garg, R., Woodward, A., & Williams, D. (2022) · CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems · doi:10.1145/3491102.3501995 · Cited by 98 · see citing works
“Prior work has shown the benefit of conversational devices such as Alexa or Google Home in non-native English speakers practicing English [26, 35, 51], although for some groups, such as urban Indians who often code-mix while engaging in human-to-human conversations, using voice assistants present unique struggles [35].”
BackgroundSelf-citation
- Authors
- Garg, R., Cui, H., & Kapadia, Y.
- Affiliations
- Syracuse University (US)
- Venue
- Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction
- Published
- 2021-10-13
- Volume
- 5
- Issue
- CSCW2
- Pages
- 1-28
- ISSN
- 2573-0142 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W3205526676
- Cited by
- 15
- References
- 17
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 4 · 2024: 5 · 2022: 3
- FWCI
- 1.23
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Human-Computer Interaction › Innovative Human-Technology Interaction
- Social Sciences › Demography › Technology Use by Older Adults
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Artificial Intelligence › AI in Service Interactions
- Keywords
- smart speakers, Google Home, voice assistants, technology adoption, user behavior, device abandonment, generational differences, activity logs, urban India, design guidelines
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