An exploratory study on how children interact with pedagogic conversational agents

Abstract

A pedagogic conversational agent (PCA) can be defined as a computer system that interacts with the student in natural language assuming the role of the instructor, a student or a companion. It can have a personality and can generate different sentences according to the agent or the student mood. Empathy with the students' feelings seems to increase their motivation to study. However, the influence of the agent personality and role as well as the students' opinion is still unclear. Therefore, in this article, it is explored with the help of a field experiment, for the first time, how these factors can affect the interaction of children with PCAs, and their opinions according to an anonymous and voluntary opinion questionnaire and some personal interviews.