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Today, I want to share a few insights about conversational AI published by Disney Research, Let Me Finish First — The Effect of Interruption-Handling Strategy (2024), where the team explored a question that has puzzled developers and designers alike: how should AI respond to interruptions?
The way we people interrupt each other is incredibly nuanced. We’ve got everything from polite interjections to, well, full-blown conversation hijacking. How can we possibly teach AI to navigate those murky waters?
In this study, researchers created an interactive game where people had to gather information by interacting and interrupting a virtual agent, this game was focused on 3 interrupting strategies:
- Ignore (IGNR): The agent continues speaking, completely ignoring the user’s attempts to interrupt.
- Accept (ACPT): The agent immediately stops talking and let the user speak.
- Acknowledge (ACKN): The agent pauses, acknowledges the interruption, but insists on finishing its own thought before addressing the user’s question.
The research showed that users responded most positively to the Accept strategy, finding the agent more agreeable, emotionally stable, and likable. It highlights how crucial it is to make users feel heard and to respond to their input promptly.
But surprisingly, Acknowledge was the least popular strategy. Users found it awkward and frustrating to wait for…
