Awareness and use of Virtual Assistant Technologies by postgraduate students of the University of Ibadan, Nigeria

Abstract

The spread of the Internet has led to advanced technological inventions. One of the technological innovations considered engaging is the Virtual assistants (VAs), designed to imitate human-like behaviours. This study was designed to investigate the awareness and use of VAs focusing on postgraduate students at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria. A survey research design was adopted, and a multistage sampling technique was used to select the respondents. Data was collected with a structured questionnaire. Findings revealed that most students were aware of VAs and had a high level of use. VAs were used for various purposes, mainly general knowledge, work-related tasks, and entertainment. The students used VAs because of the following: the multitasking ability of VAs, the ability of VAs to provide immediate feedback to users, the ability of VAs to provide personalised and individualised communication with users, the fun derived from the use, the ability of the user to pick up on other signals or information that are conveyed through VAs, and the ability of VAs to understand and convey information in everyday language that its users easily understand. A major challenge associated with use is that VAs sometimes misunderstand the students’ requests or commands because of differences in accents. Since an individual’s understanding of VAs plays a crucial role in their utilisation, stakeholders should consider providing education and training programmes that could increase users’ knowledge and confidence in interacting with VAs to ensure increased and continuous usage. VA developers need to improve on language and accent recognition.