While standalone Voice Assistants (VAs) are promising to support older adults' daily routine and wellbeing management, onboarding and setting up these devices can be challenging. Although some older adults choose to seek assistance from technicians and adult children, easy set up processes that facilitate independent use are still critical, especially for those who do not have access to external resources. We aim to understand the older adults' experience while setting up commercially available voice-only and voice-first screen-based VAs. Rooted in participants observations and semi-structured interviews, we designed a within-subject study with 10 older adults using Amazon Echo Dot and Echo Show. We identified the values of the built-in touchscreen and the instruction documents, as well as the impact of form factors, and outline important directions to support older adult independence with VAs.

翻译：尽管独立式语音助手具有支持老年人日常生活与健康管理的潜力，但设备初始化及配置过程仍存在挑战。虽然部分老年人选择向技术人员或子女寻求帮助，但简化设置流程以促进其独立使用至关重要——尤其对于缺乏外部资源获取渠道的老年群体而言。本研究旨在探究老年人在设置商用纯语音交互设备与以语音优先的触屏式语音助手时的实际体验。基于参与者观察与半结构化访谈，我们组织10名老年人开展受试者内实验，分别使用亚马逊Echo Dot与Echo Show设备。通过分析内置触屏功能与操作指南文档的实际价值，以及设备形态因素的影响，本研究为构建支持老年人独立使用语音助手的关键方向提供了重要启示。