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Conversational AI: Respecifying Participation as Regulation

Stuart Reeves Orcid Logo, Martin Porcheron Orcid Logo

Handbook of Digital Society

Swansea University Author: Martin Porcheron Orcid Logo

Abstract

When we talk about AI-driven systems there is a tendency by researchers to treat people encountering them as ‘participants’ in human-machine interactions. This seems particularly true for so-called conversational AI, such as voice interfaces or chatbots. The pervasiveness of this position is encapsu...

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Published in: Handbook of Digital Society
Published: SAGE Publications
URI: https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa60090
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first_indexed 2022-06-08T16:20:37Z
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spelling 2022-06-24T11:51:49.7616548 v2 60090 2022-05-27 Conversational AI: Respecifying Participation as Regulation d9de398c04c0b443d547d455782d5de5 0000-0003-3814-7174 Martin Porcheron Martin Porcheron true false 2022-05-27 SCS When we talk about AI-driven systems there is a tendency by researchers to treat people encountering them as ‘participants’ in human-machine interactions. This seems particularly true for so-called conversational AI, such as voice interfaces or chatbots. The pervasiveness of this position is encapsulated by the popular adoption of Nass et al.’s statement that “Computers are Social Actors” (CASA), which argues people are “mindlessly” applying human “social scripts” to AI systems; in other words, people act like participants as a kind of social reflex action. We think this is mistaken and find that a cursory look at actual interactions with (in our case) conversational AI systems reveals a different picture. Taking an ethnomethodological and conversation analytic perspective, we present a series of recorded fragments of people interacting with domestic voice interfaces. These show the organised ways in which conversational AI systems are embedded into everyday action. In doing this we reframe people’s use of interactive AI technologies: far from being mindless or perfunctory, interactions with conversational AI are inextricably situated and interwoven with the sociality of a setting. Crucially, we show how AI systems are regulated within that sociality, via a wide range of practical (in our case conversational) methods. Understanding mundane regulatory work, then, is more pressing from a design perspective than working out how to design AI-driven systems to be better ‘participants’. Book chapter Handbook of Digital Society SAGE Publications 0 0 0 0001-01-01 COLLEGE NANME Computer Science COLLEGE CODE SCS Swansea University 2022-06-24T11:51:49.7616548 2022-05-27T11:08:15.5877841 Faculty of Science and Engineering School of Mathematics and Computer Science - Computer Science Stuart Reeves 0000-0001-7145-3320 1 Martin Porcheron 0000-0003-3814-7174 2
title Conversational AI: Respecifying Participation as Regulation
spellingShingle Conversational AI: Respecifying Participation as Regulation
Martin Porcheron
title_short Conversational AI: Respecifying Participation as Regulation
title_full Conversational AI: Respecifying Participation as Regulation
title_fullStr Conversational AI: Respecifying Participation as Regulation
title_full_unstemmed Conversational AI: Respecifying Participation as Regulation
title_sort Conversational AI: Respecifying Participation as Regulation
author_id_str_mv d9de398c04c0b443d547d455782d5de5
author_id_fullname_str_mv d9de398c04c0b443d547d455782d5de5_***_Martin Porcheron
author Martin Porcheron
author2 Stuart Reeves
Martin Porcheron
format Book chapter
container_title Handbook of Digital Society
institution Swansea University
publisher SAGE Publications
college_str Faculty of Science and Engineering
hierarchytype
hierarchy_top_id facultyofscienceandengineering
hierarchy_top_title Faculty of Science and Engineering
hierarchy_parent_id facultyofscienceandengineering
hierarchy_parent_title Faculty of Science and Engineering
department_str School of Mathematics and Computer Science - Computer Science{{{_:::_}}}Faculty of Science and Engineering{{{_:::_}}}School of Mathematics and Computer Science - Computer Science
document_store_str 0
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description When we talk about AI-driven systems there is a tendency by researchers to treat people encountering them as ‘participants’ in human-machine interactions. This seems particularly true for so-called conversational AI, such as voice interfaces or chatbots. The pervasiveness of this position is encapsulated by the popular adoption of Nass et al.’s statement that “Computers are Social Actors” (CASA), which argues people are “mindlessly” applying human “social scripts” to AI systems; in other words, people act like participants as a kind of social reflex action. We think this is mistaken and find that a cursory look at actual interactions with (in our case) conversational AI systems reveals a different picture. Taking an ethnomethodological and conversation analytic perspective, we present a series of recorded fragments of people interacting with domestic voice interfaces. These show the organised ways in which conversational AI systems are embedded into everyday action. In doing this we reframe people’s use of interactive AI technologies: far from being mindless or perfunctory, interactions with conversational AI are inextricably situated and interwoven with the sociality of a setting. Crucially, we show how AI systems are regulated within that sociality, via a wide range of practical (in our case conversational) methods. Understanding mundane regulatory work, then, is more pressing from a design perspective than working out how to design AI-driven systems to be better ‘participants’.
published_date 0001-01-01T04:17:54Z
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score 11.012678

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