The digital platforms have played a significant role in the tough times of the COVID-19 pandemic in establishing a better understanding of any topic or any meetings. With the help of chatbots, it is easier to manage things and meetings whenever we want, with their expeditious and intuitive way to complete the task like scheduling and finding insightful information using natural or regional language. Aalto University researchers have now harnessed the power of chatbots to help developers and designers develop new applications and allow the end-users to find information on the apps on their devices such as mobile phones, laptops, and others.
Different types of applications and user interfaces contain a large amount of information that can be used for various needs and tasks. In their study, the researchers set out to find the most desirable chatbot features and how users would communicate with them.
The experiment selected three target groups which were the designers, software developers, and general users. More than 100 designers, developers, and regular users took part in the survey. The experiment's goal was to understand what skills and functions different types of users find most beneficial in using this new type of chatbot and how they would ask questions, especially what types of words and phrases they would use. "This is an important first step in developing chatbots that can help users find information about applications through simple conversations," said Kashyap Todi, a postdoctoral researcher at Aalto University. As a result of the survey, 21 key characteristics and 1,300+ of the most frequently asked questions by users were collected and analyzed to create Hey's user interface that enables users to find information in user interfaces through simple conversations based on the frequently used expressions collected in the survey.
