Understanding voice-based information uncertainty: A case study of health information seeking with voice assistants

Evaluating information quality online is increasingly important for healthy decision-making. People assess information quality using visual interfaces (e.g., computers, smartphones) with visual cues like aesthetics. Yet, voice interfaces lack critical visual cues for evaluating information because there is often no visual display. Without ways to assess voice-based information quality, people may overly trust or misinterpret information which can be challenging in high-risk or sensitive contexts. This paper investigates voice information uncertainty in one high-risk context—health information seeking. We recruited 30 adults (ages 18–84) in the United States to participate in scenario-based interviews about health topics. Our findings provide evidence of information uncertainty expectations with voice assistants, voice search preferences, and the audio cues they use to assess information quality. We contribute a nuanced discussion of how to inform more critical information ecosystems with voice technologies and propose ways to design audio cues to help people more quickly assess content quality.