It is estimated that over half of bicycle crashes are not reported. There are various reasons for this, such as no property damage or physical injuries sustained. In order to improve the likelihood that bicycle riders will report a crash, I have developed Urban Bike Buddy, a smartphone application which uses the internal sensors of the device to detect a crash. The application interacts with Alexa to help guide the user through the crash reporting process. The innovative features of my work are the ability to initiate communication with Alexa without user interaction. In addition, there is an intersection controller that has been connected to extra hardware that allows bicycle riders to request a crossing signal during their approach based on the speed that they are riding. These features add value to bicycle riders, and will help contribute to a safer environment for bicycle riders, automobiles, and pedestrians as well.

Conversational interfaces (CIs) have been a trending topic in recent years. As of the last decade, CIs have emerged with the aim of simplifying human-machine interactions and found a wide use case in the market. For example, Siri and Google Assistant are some of the most well-known CIs developed by the tech giants Apple and Google. The digital landscape has evolved from web, to mobile apps, to recently CIs. Nowadays, CIs, in particular chatbots and voicebots, are becoming increasingly common. Whether navigating the web or messaging on a phone, it is likely that CIs have been confronted offering the user help.However, CIs have not managed to reach a large-scale use. Furthermore, the reasons regarding the challenges faced by CIs as well as their usability are not greatly explored. In this thesis, we explore the most relevant uses of CIs and the reasons hindering a widespread use of CIs. Our goal is to provide an insight into CIs’ uses and list the reasons regarding the challenges faced by CIs. The research study followed a mixed method approach connecting an explorative qualitative literature study, a survey and an interview. The data was collected by using a systematic mapping approach for it being more suitable for conducting an effective literature review. The survey and the interview were conducted in order to confirm the findings.According to our research, it was found that the most common use cases of CIs were in customer service, sales, travel and bookings, education, healthcare and as voice assistants. The most prominent challenges faced by CIs were poor usability, language processing and understanding, speech recognition and natural language generation and security and privacy. As a conclusion, the future looks promising for CIs, however, they need to be furher researched and developed in order to help them reach a widespread use in the future. / Konversation Gränssnitt (CIs) har varit ett trendande ämne de senaste åren. Sedan det senaste decenniet har CIs kommit fram i syfte att förenkla interaktioner mellan människor och maskiner och har hittat ett brett användningsfall på marknaden. Det digitala landskapet har utvecklats från webb, till mobila appar till nyligen CI. Numera blir CIs, i synnerhet chatbots och voicebots, allt vanligare. Vare sig du navigerar på webben eller meddelanden i en telefon, är det troligt att CIs har konfronterats med att erbjuda användaren hjälp.CIs har dock inte lyckats uppnå storskalig användning. Dessutom är orsakerna till de utmaningar som CIs står inför och deras användbarhet inte utforskas i hög grad. I den här avhandlingen undersöker vi de mest relevanta användningarna av CIs och orsakerna till en utbredd användning av CIs. Vårt mål är att ge en inblick i CI: s användningar och lista orsakerna till de utmaningar som CIs står inför. Forskningsstudien följde en blandad metodstrategi som ansluter en utforskande kvalitativ litteraturstudie, en undersökning och en intervju. Uppgifterna samlades in med hjälp av en systematisk kartläggningsätt för att göra dem mer lämpliga för att genomföra en effektiv litteraturgranskning. Undersökningen och intervjun genomfördes för att bekräfta resultaten.Enligt vår forskning konstaterades att de vanligaste användningsfallen för CIs var kundservice, försäljning, resor och bokningar, utbildning, sjukvård och som röstassistenter. De mest framstående utmaningarna för CIs var dålig användbarhet, språkhantering och förståelse, taligenkänning och naturlig språkgenerering och säkerhet och integritet. Sammanfattningsvis ser framtiden lovande ut för CIs, men de måste undersökas och utvecklas ytterligare för att hjälpa dem att uppnå utbredd användning i framtiden.

Technological advancements have allowed the design of more realistic virtual characters, for example, in-game development; meanwhile, researchers argue that more realism is not always suitable. As an explorative pilot study, this thesis investigates the uncanny among human-like agents and intelligent systems with human-like attributes. The thesis focuses on the uncanny theories to understand whether Mori's Uncanny Valley (UV) or Tinwell's Uncanny wall (UW) is more suitable when designing with a user-centred approach. The study facilitated two remote focus group workshops consisting of seven participants to understand the participant's expectations, needs and desires of existing and future AI technology. The participants consisted of two target groups, gamers and non-gamers, in order to understand if exposure to AI leads to adoptability of the technology. The participants described their perspectives and needs of existing AI assistants, and their preferences of human-like cross modality such as voice and avatar for future assistants. The research activities resulted in insights and four themes: rejection of existing assistant technology, productivity and task management, expectations of future AI assistants and balancing human-likeness. Findings show that participants reject existing assistant technologies, as old tangible habits, social norms, and incompatibility prevent the adoption of existing assistant technology. While both gamers and non-gamers seek a balance between generic robotics and pure human likeness, none of the participants fully adopted the idea of human likeness as it generates uncanny feelings.

This thesis aims to explore and describe the content diversity of Siri’s search results in the polarized context of US politics. To do so, a crowdsourced audit was conducted. A diverse sample of 134 US-based Siri users between the ages of 18-64 performed five identical queries about the politically controversial issues of gun laws, immigration, the death penalty, taxes and abortion. The data were viewed through a theoretical framework using the concepts of algorithmic bias and media-centric fragmentation. The results suggest that Siri’s search algorithm produces a long tail distribution of search results: Forty-two percent of the participants received the six most frequent answers, while 22% of the users received unique answers. These statistics indicate that Siri’s search algorithm causes moderate concentration and low fragmentation. The age and, surprisingly, the political orientation of users, do not seem to be driving either concentration or fragmentation. However, the users' gender and location appears to cause low concentration. The finding that Siri’s search algorithm produces a long tail of replies challenges previous research on the content diversity of search results, which found no evidence of fragmentation. However, due to the limited scope of this study, these findings cannot be generalized to a larger population. Further research is needed to support or refute them.

As society progresses towards a more algorithmic era, the influence of artificial intelligence (AI) is driving a revolution in the digital landscape. At its core, AI applications aim to engage customers by providing carefully tailored and data-driven personalization and customization of products, services, and marketing mix elements. However, the adoption of AI, while promising enhanced personalization, poses challenges due to the increased collection, analysis, and control of consumer data by technology owners. Consequently, concerns over data privacy have emerged as a primary consideration for individuals. This paper delves deeper into the implications of the personalization- privacy paradox, aiming to provide a comprehensive analysis of the challenges and opportunities it presents. The purpose of this thesis is to understand users’ privacy concerns and willingness to disclose their personal information to AI technologies by addressing the limitations of previous research and utilizing qualitative methods to gain a more in-depth understanding of consumer views. To understand users’ privacy concerns and willingness to disclose personal information to AI technologies, a qualitative approach was followed. Combining a deductive and inductive approach to fulfill the purpose of the study, empirical data was collected through 20 semi- structured interviews. The participants were chosen using a purposive sampling technique. Users’ privacy concerns and willingness to disclose personal information to AI technologies differ significantly. It depends not only on the individual, but also on the type of AI technology, the company providing the AI technology, the possibility of obtaining additional benefits, and whether the company is transparent about its data collection and can provide proof of security.

The voice technology today is limited to explicit interaction and does not take advantage of the connotation of voice modalities. Research has shown that it is possible to sense emotions and feelings as well as the context of information based on the tone of voice. Building on existing theory and Research through Design, this thesis aims to speculate the use of whispering in human-computer interaction. It also discusses how this might lead to a more preferred future or cause tensions within addictive technology and the politics of voice assistants. The results argue that whispering has an impact on the relationship and trust between a human and a machine and that it could be used as an active interaction mode with voice assistants. Further research is needed to identify the effect of whispering on different users and the influence of different voice modalities. / Röstteknologin idag är begränsad till explicit interaktion och utnyttjar inte konnotationen av röstmodaliteter. Forskning har visat att det är möjligt att identifiera känslor och sammanhang med information baserad på tonfallet. Med utgångspunkt i befintlig teori och Research through Design, syftar denna avhandling till att spekulera kring användningen av viskning i interaktion mellan människor och datorer. Det diskuteras hur detta kan leda till en mer gynnsam framtid alternativt orsaka konflikt inom beroendeframkallande teknik och röstassistenternas politik. Resultaten menar att viskning påverkar förhållandet och förtroendet mellan människa och maskin och att den kan användas som ett aktivt interaktionsläge hos röstassistenter. Ytterligare forskning behövs för att identifiera effekten av viskning på olika användare och påverkan av olika röstmodaliteter.

Smart homes are based on connecting different parts and components of the household through sensors and the use of the internet. The interconnection of the household enables control and remote control of the home. The factors behind consumer adoption of the smart home have been studied but there are still questions regarding the value propositions of smart homes. This study presents material that can provide insights into what value propositions young adults demand in smart home products. The methods used to produce the study results were, a survey and a questionnaire. The results from the survey showed that smart voice assistants were appreciated by the participants. However, all the participants believed the functional value of the smart voice assistants was limited. After participating in the survey, they felt no real need for the smart voice assistant in their home. The results from the questionnaire’s 112 answers showed that a large majority of the respondents did not own a smart voice assistant. Many did however, express a positive opinion towards voice assistants and were open to the purchase of a smart voice assistant in the future. The small number of respondents that did own a smart voice assistant were all satisfied with their purchase of a smart voice assistant

Voice assistants are a remarkable example of the potential for AI to become further entwined with social life. However, they are produced by some of the world’s largest tech corporations and are rooted in capitalistic processes that depend on user data. This thesis presents a qualitative exploratory study of voice assistants. Through a combination of interviews and theoretical analysis, it focuses on participants’ perceptions and experiences with these AI agents and how they are embedded in the bigger picture of surveillance capitalism. The findings reveal the physical characteristics and personality traits that participants in this study ascribe to voice assistants, highlighting the implications of treating voice assistants as personified agents and the factors contributing to these perceptions. Further, this thesis examines how surveillance capitalism is present in participant interactions with these technologies and identifies how its reach into people’s lives is provoked by their design and background contexts. Lastly, it provides an overview of corporate power in the tech industry and how the structural, cultural, and political circumstances enable and legitimize big tech’s authority in digital environments and how this situates the individual and their capacity to contend with technological issues. / Graduate / 2023-07-12

В работе производиться анализ многоагентных интеллектуальных систем, их различия, способы и направления применения. Описываются программы и методы создания аудио управляемого синтеза лица. Также обсуждаются различные цифровые голосовые помощники, виртуальные агенты. Рассматривается гипотеза и перспективы создания визуального виртуального цифрового помощника для средств массовой информации. / The paper analyzes multi-agent intelligent systems, their differences, ways and directions of application. Programs and methods for creating audio-controlled face synthesis are described. Various digital voice assistants and virtual agents are also discussed. The hypothesis and prospects of creating a visual virtual digital assistant for mass media are considered.

[pt] Assistentes de Voz (AVs) trazem diversos benefícios para os usuários e estão se tornando progressivamente populares, mas algumas barreiras para adoção de AVs ainda persistem, como atitudes dos usuários, preocupações com privacidade e percepções negativas desses sistemas. Uma abordagem para mitigar os obstáculos e melhorar as interações pode ser entender os modelos mentais dos usuários de AVs, uma vez que estudos indicam que o entendimento dos usuários não é alinhado com as reais capacidades desses sistemas. Assim, considerando a importância de um modelo mental correto para as interações, explorar fatores geradores de percepções inadequadas e soluções para lidar com tal questão pode ser essencial. O objetivo desta pesquisa foi identificar fatores influentes para as percepções inadequadas de usuários e oferecer recomendações de design para alinhar os modelos mentais de usuários com as reais capacidades desses sistemas. Para alcançar esse objetivo, nós conduzimos uma revisão sistemática de literatura, entrevistas exploratórias com experts e um estudo Delphi de três rodadas com base em questionários. Os resultados indicam que os aspectos de design como a humanização dos AVs e a transparência em respostas do sistema são influentes para os modelos mentais. Apesar desses fatores terem sido indicados como causas para incorreções em modelos mentais, remover a humanização dos AVs e apresentar informações excessivas pode não ser uma solução imediada. Indica-se que designers devem avaliar o contexto de uso e os domínios de tarefa em que os AVs serão usados para guiar as soluções de design. Além disso, os designers devem entender os perfis e backgrounds dos usuários para ajustar as interações uma vez que as características dos usuários são influentes para sua percepção do produto. Finalmente, o time de desenvolvimento deve ter um entendimento correto e homogêneo do AVs, e deve possuir o conhecimento necessário para aplicar soluções corretamente. Esse último requisito é desafiador porque os AVs são produtos relativamente novos e podem demandar que os profissionais dominem novas habilidades e ferramentas. / [en] Voice Assistants (VAs) bring various benefits for users and are increasingly popular, but some barriers for VA adoption and usage still prevail, such as users attitudes, privacy concerns, and negative perceptions towards these systems. An approach to mitigating such obstacles and leveraging voice interactions may be understanding users mental models of VAs, since studies indicate that users understandings of VAs are unaligned with these systems actual capabilities. Thus, considering the importance of a correct mental model for interactions, exploring influential factors causing misperceptions and solutions to deal with this issue may be paramount. The objective of this research was to identify leading causes of users misperceptions and offer design recommendations for aligning users mental models of VAs with these systems real capacities. In order to achieve this goal, we conducted a systematic literature review (SLR), exploratory interviews with experts, and a questionnaire-based three-round Delphi study. The results indicate that design aspects such as VAs high humanness and the lack of outputs transparency are influential for mental models. Despite the indication that these drivers lead to users misperceptions, removing VAs humanness and excessively displaying information about VAs might not be an immediate solution. In turn, developers should assess the context and task domains in which the VA will be used to guide design decisions. Moreover, developers should understand the users profiles and backgrounds to adjust interactions, as users characteristics are influential for how they perceive the product. Finally, developing teams should have a correct and homogeneous understanding of VAs and possess the necessary knowledge to employ solutions properly. This latter requirement is challenging since VAs novelty might demand professionals to master new skills and tools.