"Who wants to be nagged by AI?": Investigating the Effects of Agreeableness on Older Adults' Perception of LLM-Based Voice Assistants' Explanations

TL;DR

This study explores how the agreeableness of AI voice assistants affects older adults' perceptions of explanations, highlighting the importance of personality and context in designing effective, trustworthy, and empathetic AI support for aging populations.

Contribution

It provides empirical insights into the influence of VA agreeableness on perception, emphasizing the need for personalized AI explanations based on personality and situational context.

Findings

High-agreeableness assistants are perceived as more trustworthy and empathetic.

In emergencies, clarity of explanations outweighs warmth.

Environmental explanations outperform history-based ones.

Abstract

LLM-based voice assistants (VAs) increasingly support older adults aging in place, yet how an assistant's agreeableness shapes explanation perception remains underexplored. We conducted a study(N=70) examining how VA agreeableness influences older adults' perceptions of explanations across routine and emergency home scenarios. High-agreeableness assistants were perceived as more trustworthy, empathetic, and likable, but these benefits diminished in emergencies where clarity outweighed warmth. Agreeableness did not affect perceived intelligence, suggesting social tone and competence are separable dimensions. Real-time environmental explanations outperformed history-based ones, and agreeable older adults penalized low-agreeableness assistants more strongly. These findings show the need to move beyond a one-size-fits-all approach to AI explainability, while balancing personality, context, and audience.