Contrasting Affiliation and Reference Cues for Conversational Agents in Smart Environments

Samantha Reig, Terrence Fong, Elizabeth J. Carter, Aaron Steinfeld, Jodi Forlizzi

Abstract: This paper investigates how conversational agents that are embedded in smart environments should present themselves socially. In an online study, we simulate a future space habitat in which "astronauts" (participants) interact with one or more agents to complete several tasks related to science, maintenance, and inventory. We examine effects of agent affiliation (affiliation with a user, affiliation with a domain, or affiliation with all users and all domains) and narrative perspective (first-vs. third-person references to parts of the environment) on mental models of the smart environment as one or multiple entities, trust, performance, and social variables. Our findings suggest that in this type of setting, interacting with a single agent may increase mental demand, and that agents that speak about embodied interaction in third person are perceived as more trustworthy and competent than agents that speak in first person.