PUBLICATION
An Analysis of Federal and Municipal Chatbots in Germany (in print)
Type
Conference Paper
Year
2026
Authors
Research Area
Web Engineering
Event
9th International Workshop on Chatbots and Human-centred AI (CONVERSATIONS)
Published in
CONVERSATION 2025
ISBN/ISSN
tba
Abstract
With the increased use of chatbots, a multitude of graphical interfaces are created to support the conversational interaction between user and chatbot. For graphical user interfaces, guidelines and best practices were developed and adapted over decades, but this is not yet the case for chatbots. In this paper we present the results of an explorative user study with 40 participants regarding the preferences of users for variations of established design patterns in chatbot interfaces. The study includes five chatbot prototypes with different combinations of pattern variations which are based on an analysis of 30 chatbots in the web. The results of the explorative study show significant differences for all pattern variations and indicate that users have some expectations regarding chatbot interfaces. With insights into the coding of the dataset, the statistical evaluation, and similarities to other interfaces, we highlight the necessity and some implications for the future creation of chatbot interface guidelines.