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Heike Ollesch, Edgar Heineken
Social Influence of Computer-Generated Agents in a Virtual Environment
Keywords: Emotional strain, Leadership behavior, Presence, Social influence, Social presence
When interacting with computer-generated agents (agent avatars) in virtual environments, actors experience social presence only to a small degree since they are aware that the agent avatars don′t represent veritable human beings. However, can agent avatars exert social influcence on actors in spite of this? According to Blascovich et al. (2002) social influcence still takes place if the small degree of social presence is compensated by a high degree of behavioral realism of the agent avatars. It is examined if sufficient behavioral realism can be achieved by modelling agent avatars so that their communication patterns for the interaction with the actors reflect personality traits and motives in a consistent manner. Following Blascovich′s model, the hypothesis is tested experimentally, that “agent-personalities” whose communication patterns are designed differently will exert social influence on actors in a different way. It is expected that actors will react differently to an agent with choleric temperament and “impulsive” traits compared to an agent with melancholic temperament and “anxious” traits. Thirty participants, mostly students, acted as managers of a virtual company in the computer-based scenario MotivatorOne. By means of appropriate communication with different virtual employees – including one “anxious” and one “impulsive” agent-personality – they had to strive for economic success. Indicators of participants′ behavior in interacting with the agents were recorded; emotional and communicative strain experienced during the course of these interactions were assessed afterwards. Results corroborate the hypothesis: Participants′ communicative behavior as well as their emotional reactions depend on the agents′ personalities. Results circumstantiate that aedequately designed agent avatars can exert social influcence on actors in a virtual environment.
i-com, Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag
Print ISSN: 1618-162X
Volume: 05, 02/2006
Pages: 051 - 058