Purpose

Virtual assistants are increasingly used for persuasive purposes, employing the different modalities of voice and text (or a combination of the two). In this study, the authors compare the persuasiveness of voice-and text-based virtual assistants. The authors argue for perceived human-likeness and cognitive load as underlying mechanisms that can explain why voice- and text-based assistants differ in their persuasive potential by suppressing the activation of consumers' persuasion knowledge.

Design/methodology/approach

A pre-registered online-experiment (n = 450) implemented a text-based and two voice-based (with and without interaction history displayed in text) virtual assistants.

Findings

Findings show that, contrary to expectations, a text-based assistant is perceived as more human-like compared to a voice-based assistant (regardless of whether the interaction history is displayed), which in turn positively influences brand attitudes and purchase intention. The authors also find that voice as a communication modality can increase persuasion knowledge by being cognitively more demanding in comparison to text.

Practical implications

Simply using voice as a presumably human cue might not suffice to give virtual assistants a human-like appeal. For the development of virtual assistants, it might be beneficial to actively engage consumers to increase awareness of persuasion.

Originality/value

The current study adds to the emergent research stream considering virtual assistants in explicitly exploring modality differences between voice and text (and a combination of the two) and provides insights into the effects of persuasion coming from virtual assistants.

中文翻译：

---

声音真的有说服力吗？模态在虚拟助手交互中的影响和两种替代解释

目的

虚拟助手越来越多地用于说服目的，采用不同的语音和文本形式（或两者的组合）。在这项研究中，作者比较了基于语音和基于文本的虚拟助手的说服力。作者认为感知到的人类相似性和认知负荷是可以解释为什么基于语音和基于文本的助手通过抑制消费者说服知识的激活而在说服潜力方面存在差异的潜在机制。

设计/方法/途径

一个预先注册的在线实验 ( n  = 450) 实现了一个基于文本的和两个基于语音的（有和没有文本显示的交互历史）虚拟助手。

发现

调查结果表明，与预期相反，与基于语音的助手相比，基于文本的助手被认为更像人（无论是否显示交互历史），这反过来对品牌态度和购买意愿产生积极影响。作者还发现，与文本相比，语音作为一种交流方式在认知上要求更高，因此可以增加说服知识。

实际影响

简单地使用语音作为可能的人类提示可能不足以让虚拟助手具有类似人类的吸引力。对于虚拟助手的开发，积极吸引消费者以提高说服意识可能是有益的。

原创性/价值

当前的研究增加了考虑虚拟助手的新兴研究流，以明确探索语音和文本（以及两者的组合）之间的模态差异，并提供对来自虚拟助手的说服效果的见解。