Who are the (Non-)Adopters of Smart Speakers? A Cross-Sectional Survey Study of Dutch families

Smart speakers are becoming increasingly prevalent in the life of families with young children. While the body of literature on the adoption and use of smart speakers is growing, the question about who those families are that decide to adopt a device and how they differ from those who do not is often neglected. To fill this gap, we conducted a cross-sectional survey study and analysed N = 187 self-reports of Dutch parents. Families with (34%) and without (66%) a smart speaker differ along their trust in technology, internet literacy, and preferred media-mediation style. Findings show a clear tendency for second-digital-divide characteristics. Interestingly, children are not yet widely granted independent access at home. This study offers guidelines for industry in terms of families’ adoption of future technologies, as well as inspiring future research on meaningful smart speaker interventions for families to ensure the technology remains at the service for them.