"Oh dear stacy!": social interaction, elaboration, and learning with teachable agents
05 May 2012-pp 39-48
TL;DR: Treating her as a partner, primarily through aligning oneself with Stacy using pronouns like you or the authors rather than she or it significantly correlates with student learning, as do playful face-threatening comments such as teasing, while elaborate explanations of Stacy's behavior in the third-person and formal tutoring statements reduce learning gains.
Abstract: Understanding how children perceive and interact with teachable agents (systems where children learn through teaching a synthetic character embedded in an intelligent tutoring system) can provide insight into the effects of so-cial interaction on learning with intelligent tutoring systems. We describe results from a think-aloud study where children were instructed to narrate their experience teaching Stacy, an agent who can learn to solve linear equations with the student's help. We found treating her as a partner, primarily through aligning oneself with Stacy using pronouns like you or we rather than she or it significantly correlates with student learning, as do playful face-threatening comments such as teasing, while elaborate explanations of Stacy's behavior in the third-person and formal tutoring statements reduce learning gains. Additionally, we found that the agent's mistakes were a significant predictor for students shifting away from alignment with the agent.
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08 Sep 2021
TL;DR: This article investigated whether perceived anthropomorphism can be measured from team communication behaviors in a simulated remotely piloted aircraft system task environment, in which two humans in unique roles were asked to team with a synthetic (i.e., autonomous) pilot agent.
Abstract: Trust in autonomous teammates has been shown to be a key factor in human-autonomy team (HAT) performance, and anthropomorphism is a closely related construct that is underexplored in HAT literature. This study investigates whether perceived anthropomorphism can be measured from team communication behaviors in a simulated remotely piloted aircraft system task environment, in which two humans in unique roles were asked to team with a synthetic (i.e., autonomous) pilot agent. We compared verbal and self-reported measures of anthropomorphism with team error handling performance and trust in the synthetic pilot. Results for this study show that trends in verbal anthropomorphism follow the same patterns expected from self-reported measures of anthropomorphism, with respect to fluctuations in trust resulting from autonomy failures.
8 citations
25 Jun 2019
TL;DR: Emma, a teachable robotic agent that can speak socially and adapt on both pitch and loudness is introduced and it appears that an individual’s initial comfort level with robots may influence how they respond to such behavior, suggesting that for individuals who are more comfortable interacting with robots, social behavior may have a more positive influence.
Abstract: Teachable agents are pedagogical agents that employ the ‘learning-by-teaching’ strategy, which facilitates learning by encouraging students to construct explanations, reflect on misconceptions, and elaborate on what they know. Teachable agents present unique opportunities to maximize the benefits of a ‘learning-by-teaching’ experience. For example, teachable agents can provide socio-emotional support to learners, influencing learner self-efficacy and motivation, and increasing learning. Prior work has found that a teachable agent which engages learners socially through social dialogue and paraverbal adaptation on pitch can have positive effects on rapport and learning. In this work, we introduce Emma, a teachable robotic agent that can speak socially and adapt on both pitch and loudness. Based on the phenomenon of entrainment, multi-feature adaptation on tone and loudness has been found in human-human interactions to be highly correlated to learning and social engagement. In a study with 48 middle school participants, we performed a novel exploration of how multi-feature adaptation can influence learner rapport and learning as an independent social behavior and combined with social dialogue. We found significantly more rapport for Emma when the robot both adapted and spoke socially than when Emma only adapted and indications of a similar trend for learning. Additionally, it appears that an individual’s initial comfort level with robots may influence how they respond to such behavior, suggesting that for individuals who are more comfortable interacting with robots, social behavior may have a more positive influence.
7 citations
Cites background from ""Oh dear stacy!": social interactio..."
...Some research has shown that when learners feel more rapport for their agent, they are more likely to benefit [2]....
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03 Apr 2014
TL;DR: This study proposes the use of a human-like, embodied conversational agent in an e-learning system to interactively guide users through content and subsequently improve efficacy.
Abstract: E-learners have to study independently without educators, making it difficult for them to maintain interest or motivation. This study proposes the use of a human-like, embodied conversational agent in an e-learning system to interactively guide users through content and subsequently improve efficacy. Additionally, we investigate the effect of the agent's posture on users' a) learning motivation, b) engagement, c) perception of the agent, and d) learning efficacy. Forty-one undergraduate students participated in our empirical study, which revealed that through the use of human-like postures learners' learning motivation and engagement increased.
7 citations
Cites background from ""Oh dear stacy!": social interactio..."
...[10] developed SimStudent, a tutoring system for secondary math education that employed a human-like, female embodied agent....
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TL;DR: The Curiosity Notebook as mentioned in this paper is a web-based research infrastructure for studying learning by teaching via the use of a teachable agent, which is a learning phenomenon that is difficult to study due to variability in the tutor-teacher pairings and learning environments.
Abstract: While learning by teaching is a popular pedagogical technique, it is a learning phenomenon that is difficult to study due to variability in the tutor-tutee pairings and learning environments. In this paper, we introduce the Curiosity Notebook, a web-based research infrastructure for studying learning by teaching via the use of a teachable agent. We describe and provide rationale for the set of features that are essential for such a research infrastructure, outline how these features have evolved over two design iterations of the Curiosity Notebook and through two studies -- a 4-week field study with 12 elementary school students interacting with a NAO robot and an hour-long online observational study with 41 university students interacting with an agent -- demonstrate the utility of our platform for making observations of learning-by-teaching phenomena in diverse learning environments. Based on these findings, we conclude the paper by reflecting on our design evolution and envisioning future iterations of the Curiosity Notebook.
7 citations
21 Jun 2015
TL;DR: The authors investigated the effects of placing a teacher agent from a math game in a digital summative test and found that experience with a TA can influence test performance beyond interaction and informative feedback.
Abstract: In three quasi-experimental studies, we investigated the effects of placing a Teachable Agent (TA) from a math game in a digital summative test. We hypothesized that the TA would affect test performance, even without actual “teachability”, by social influence on the test situation. In Study 1 (N=47), students did a pretest, played the math game for seven weeks, and did a posttest either with or without the TA. In Study 2 (N=62), students did not play the game but were introduced to a TA directly in the posttest. In Study 3 (N=165), the game included a social chat with the TA, and the posttest offered a choice of more difficult questions. Results showed significant effects of the TA on choice and performance on conceptual math problems, though not on overall test scores. We conclude that experience with a TA can influence performance beyond interaction and informative feedback.
7 citations
References
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors present a procedure for having two or more judges independently categorize a sample of units and determine the degree, significance, and significance of the units. But they do not discuss the extent to which these judgments are reproducible, i.e., reliable.
Abstract: CONSIDER Table 1. It represents in its formal characteristics a situation which arises in the clinical-social-personality areas of psychology, where it frequently occurs that the only useful level of measurement obtainable is nominal scaling (Stevens, 1951, pp. 2526), i.e. placement in a set of k unordered categories. Because the categorizing of the units is a consequence of some complex judgment process performed by a &dquo;two-legged meter&dquo; (Stevens, 1958), it becomes important to determine the extent to which these judgments are reproducible, i.e., reliable. The procedure which suggests itself is that of having two (or more) judges independently categorize a sample of units and determine the degree, significance, and
34,965 citations
""Oh dear stacy!": social interactio..." refers methods in this paper
...Reliability is given for each coding category below in a Cohen’s K [8]....
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01 Jan 1987
TL;DR: Gumperz as discussed by the authors discusses politeness strategies in language and their implications for language studies, including sociological implications and implications for social sciences. But he does not discuss the relationship between politeness and language.
Abstract: Symbols and abbreviations Foreword John J. Gumperz Introduction to the reissue Notes 1. Introduction 2. Summarized argument 3. The argument: intuitive bases and derivative definitions 4. On the nature of the model 5. Realizations of politeness strategies in language 6. Derivative hypotheses 7. Sociological implications 8. Implications for language studies 9. Conclusions Notes References Author index Subject index.
9,542 citations
Book•
01 Jan 1987TL;DR: This paper presents an argument about the nature of the model and its implications for language studies and Sociological implications and discusses the role of politeness strategies in language.
Abstract: This study is about the principles for constructing polite speeches. The core of it first appeared in Questions and Politeness, edited by Esther N. Goody (now out of print). It is here reissued with a fresh introduction that surveys the considerable literature in linguistics, psychology and the social sciences that the original extended essay stimulated, and suggests distinct directions for research. The authors describe and account for some remarkable parallelisms in the linguistic construction of utterances with which people express themselves in different languages and cultures. A motive for these parallels is isolated and a universal model is constructed outlining the abstract principles underlying polite usages. This is based on the detailed study of three unrelated languages and cultures: the Tamil of South India, the Tzeltal spoken by Mayan Indians in Chiapas, Mexico, and the English of the USA and England. This volume will be of special interest to students in linguistic pragmatics, sociolinguistics, applied linguistics, anthropology, and the sociology and social psychology of interaction.
9,053 citations
""Oh dear stacy!": social interactio..." refers background in this paper
...face-threatening, by which is meant dialogue moves that threaten the other person’s identity management, or positive sense of him or herself [4]....
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Book•
01 Jan 1996TL;DR: This chapter discusses the media equation, which describes the role media and personality play in the development of a person's identity and aims at clarifying these roles.
Abstract: Part I. Introduction: 1. The media equation Part II. Media and Manners: 2. Politeness 3. Interpersonal distance 4. Flattery 5. Judging others and ourselves Part III. Media and Personality: 6. Personality of characters 7. Personality of interfaces 8. Imitating a personality Part IV. Media and emotion: 9. Good versus bad 10. Negativity 11. Arousal Part V. Media and Social Roles: 12. Specialists 13. Teammates 14. Gender 15. Voices 16. Source orientation Part VI. Media and Form: 17. Image size 18. Fidelity 19. Synchrony 20. Motion 21. Scene changes 22. Subliminal images Part VII. Final Words: 23. Conclusions about the media equation References.
4,690 citations
""Oh dear stacy!": social interactio..." refers background in this paper
...Students who made many formal tutoring moves and few social moves often used outside-aligned speech to discuss what Stacy did and did not know, which we hypothesize is because it would be face-threatening to discuss her incompetencies with her in detail, along the lines described by Reeves and Nass [16]....
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...HYPOTHESES Cognitive hypotheses of learning by teaching suggest that tutors will engage in more mental organization of the material and perform more self-explanation as they tutor, leading to learning gains [10,11,16,20,25]....
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...Given conflicting prior work on whether social relationships can be formed with virtual agents [5,16,17,18] we chose to look at the type of language students used when referring to the agent as a clue to their social stance....
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TL;DR: Cooperative learning is one of the greatest success stories in the history of educational research as discussed by the authors, and the most frequent objective of this research is to determine the effects of cooperative learning on student achievement.
1,563 citations
""Oh dear stacy!": social interactio..." refers background in this paper
...For example, researchers have proposed that there are substantial social aspects of peer tutoring that are responsible for evoking tutor learning effects, such as a strong feeling of accountability for ensuring the tutee is learning the proper information [24], as well as a desire to avoid the face-threat of not being able to fully respond to tutee questions [28]....
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