Perceiving Sociable Technology: Exploring the Role of Anthropomorphism and Agency Perception on Human-Computer Interaction (HCI)

With the arrival of personal assistants and other AI-enabled autonomous technologies, social interactions with smart devices have become a part of our daily lives. Therefore, it becomes increasingly important to understand how these social interactions emerge, and why users appear to be influenced by them. For this reason, I explore questions on what the antecedents and consequences of this phenomenon, known as anthropomorphism, are as described in the extant literature from fields ranging from information systems to social neuroscience. I critically analyze those empirical studies directly measuring anthropomorphism and those referring to it without a corresponding measurement. Through a grounded theory approach, I identify common themes and use them to develop models for the antecedents and consequences of anthropomorphism. The results suggest anthropomorphism possesses both conscious and non-conscious components with varying implications. While conscious attributions are shown to vary based on individual differences, non-conscious attributions emerge whenever a technology exhibits apparent reasoning such as through non-verbal behavior like peer-to-peer mirroring or verbal paralinguistic and backchanneling cues. Anthropomorphism has been shown to affect users’ self-perceptions, perceptions of the technology, how users interact with the technology, and the users’ performance. Examples include changes in a users’ trust on the technology, conformity effects, bonding, and displays of empathy. I argue these effects emerge from changes in users’ perceived agency, and their self- and social- identity similarly to interactions between humans. Afterwards, I critically examine current theories on anthropomorphism and present propositions about its nature based on the results of the empirical literature. Subsequently, I introduce a two-factor model of anthropomorphism that proposes how an individual anthropomorphizes a technology is dependent on how the technology was initially perceived (top-down and rational or bottom-up and automatic), and whether it exhibits a capacity for agency or experience. I propose that where a technology lays along this spectrum determines how individuals relates to it, creating shared agency effects, or changing the users’ social identity. For this reason, anthropomorphism is a powerful tool that can be leveraged to support future interactions with smart technologies

“I Am Here to Assist You Today”: The Role of Entity, Interactivity and Experiential Perceptions in Chatbot Persuasion

Online users are increasingly exposed to chatbots as one form of AI-enabled media technologies, employed for persuasive purposes, e.g., making product/service recommendations. However, the persuasive potential of chatbots has not yet been fully explored. Using an online experiment (N = 242), we investigate the extent to which communicating with a stand-alone chatbot influences affective and behavioral responses compared to interactive Web sites. Several underlying mechanisms are studied, showing that enjoyment is the key mechanism explaining the positive effect of chatbots (vs. Web sites) on recommendation adherence and attitudes. Contrary to expectations, perceived anthropomorphism seems not to be particularly relevant in this comparison

Exploring the Efficacy of Social Trust Repair in Human-Automation Interactions

ABSTRACT Trust is a critical component to both human-automation and human-human interactions. Interface manipulations, such as visual anthropomorphism and machine politeness, have been used to affect trust in automation. However, these design strategies have been primarily used to facilitate initial trust formation but have not been examined means to actively repair trust that has been violated by a system failure. Previous research has shown that trust in another party can be effectively repaired after a violation using various strategies, but there is little evidence substantiating such strategies in human-automation context. The current study examined the effectiveness of trust repair strategies, derived from a human-human or human-organizational context, in human-automation interaction. During a taxi dispatching task, participants interacted with imperfect automation that either denied or apologized for committing competence- or integrity-based failures. Participants performed two experimental blocks (one for each failure type), and, after each block, reported subjective trust in the automation. Consistent with interpersonal literature, our analysis revealed that automation apologies more successfully repaired trust following competence-based failures than integrity-based failures. However, user trust in automation was not significantly different when the automation denied committing competence- or integrity-based failures. These findings provide important insight into the unique ways in which humans interact with machines

Match or Mismatch? How Matching Personality and Gender between Voice Assistants and Users Affects Trust in Voice Commerce

Despite the ubiquity of voice assistants (VAs), they see limited adoption in the form of voice commerce, an online sales channel using natural language. A key barrier to the widespread use of voice commerce is the lack of user trust. To address this problem, we draw on similarity-attraction theory to investigate how trust is affected when VAs match the user’s personality and gender. We conducted a scenario-based experiment (N = 380) with four VAs designed to have different personalities and genders by customizing only the auditory cues in their voices. The results indicate that a personality match increases trust, while the effect of a gender match on trust is non-significant. Our findings contribute to research by demonstrating that some types of matches between VAs and users are more effective than others. Moreover, we reveal that it is important for practitioners to consider auditory cues when designing VAs for voice commerce

Para-Proxemic Attributions: an Investigation Into the Relationship Between Close-Up and Extreme Close-Up Camera Shots and Audience Response.

The purpose of this study was to determine if there were differences in para-proxemic attributions (effectations based upon the relative distance of a media source) to the extreme close-up as opposed to the close-up camera shots. Differences in audience response by sex of subject were found. Two stimuli were simultaneously videotaped of a man making an informative speech. The first tape was composed of establishing shots and extreme close-up shots. The second tape was comprised of establishing shots and close-up shots. The establishing shots were constant in both tapes. In the first tape a cut from the establishing shot to the extreme close-up shot would electronically trigger a cut in the second tape from the establishing shot to the close-up shot. Because of the baseline nature of research in paraproxemic attributions and the lack of a valid and reliable instrument for use as the dependent measure a pilot study was run. After viewing one of the two treatment subjects responded to a revised version of the McCroskey and Jenson instrument for the measurement of perceived image of mass media news sources. Subjects responses were subjected to image factor analysis. This analysis yielded a three factor structure for the male subjects and a four factor structure for the female subjects. A subsequent treatment condition with a new subject population yielded an almost identical factor pattern as that in the pilot study. Three factors emerged for the male subjects and four factors emerged for the female respondents. It was determined that the different factor structures showed a difference in subjects attributions toward the stimulus based upon the independent variable of sex of respondent. Multiple discriminant analysis was then run to determine if the sex specific instruments could differentiate subjects responses by treatment condition. Results of those analyses showed that the sex specific instruments could correctly classify the subjects by para-proxemic treatment conditions upwards of 63% in every condition except the male extreme close-up condition. The lack of linearity of responses in this condition was explained as a result of a response ambiguity for males in an invading situation. Further research was suggested to determine which specific items were responded to differently by treatment conditions. Additionally, a different stimulus needed to be designed specific to new situations, and other camera shots tested in varying combinations

Workplace commitment as an exchange of commitments : exploring public managers' practices to secure employees' commitment

While discussion of workplace commitment is not quite new, the (public) Management, HR and Organization behavior literature has largely been about commitment on the employee side. Less so on how organizations express their commitment to their employees, and particularly on the role public managers therein. In line with the exchange theory, workplace commitment may be conceive as an exchange of commitments: a perspective rarely adopted in the literature. Using a qualitative methodology, this study aims to dive into the very practices set up by public sector managers to secure their collaborators' loyalty. The 8 managers and 11 employees theoretically sampled, work within hybrid organizations (public corporations, education, health sector etc.), where the culture combines public and private management values and practices. Our analyses of the digitally recorded and transcribed interviews provide insights on organizations' commitment to their employees, thus complementing previous scholarship on organizational support, leader support and psychological contracts, in relation to workplace commitment. Specifically, this work highlights the participation of public managers in the very mechanism of organizations' commitment to their employees, by identifying key " bundles " of employer' commitment practices

The Role of Design Characteristics in Shaping Perceptions of Similarity: The Case of Online Shopping Assistants

This research proposes that technological artifacts are perceived as social actors, and that users can attribute personality and behavioral traits to them. These formed perceptions interact with the user’s own characteristics to construct an evaluation of the similarity between the user and the technological artifact. Such perceptions of similarity are important because individuals tend to more positively evaluate others, in this case technological artifacts, to whom they are more similar. Using an automated shopping assistant as one type of technological artifact, we investigate two types of perceived similarity between the customer and the artifact: perceived personality similarity and perceived behavioral similarity. We then investigate how design characteristics drive a customer’s perceptions of these similarities and, importantly, the bases for those design characteristics. Decisional guidance and speech act theory provide the basis for personality manifestation, while normative versus heuristic-based decision rules provide the basis for behavioral manifestation. We apply these design bases in an experiment. The results demonstrate that IT design characteristics can be used to manifest desired personalities and behaviors in a technological artifact. Moreover, these manifestations of personality and behavior interact with the customer’s own personality and behaviors to create matching perceptions of personality and behavioral similarity between the customer and the artifact. This study emphasizes the need to consider technological artifacts as social actors and describes the specific ways in which technology design can manifest social attributes. In doing so, we show that it is possible to match the social attributes of a technological artifact with those of the user