Cross cultural comparison of users’ barge-in with the in-vehicle speech system

Abstract

The focus of this paper is user barge-in behavior during interactions with an in-vehicle speech system. This study is part of a cross-cultural research conducted in the US and China that explored the cultural differences regarding users’ expectations and interactions with in-vehicle speech applications. In this paper, we describe the methodology of the field study, the interface of the prototype, the experimental set up, the analysis procedure, as well as the participants’ demographics from both the US and China. We categorize the observed barge-in behavior and the typical scenarios in which it occurred, from both prompt timing and a dialog sequence perspective. After analyzing all barge-in instances, we discuss design implications for a barge-in feature and system prompts of an in-vehicle speech system that considers the different cultural norms of the two regions.