Werewolves, cheats, and cultural sensitivity

This paper discusses the design and evaluation of the system MIXER (Moderating Interactions for Cross-Cultural Empathic Relationships), which applies a novel approach to the education of children in cultural sensitivity. MIXER incorporates intelligent affective and interactive characters, including a model of a Theory of Mind mechanism, in a simulated virtual world. We discuss the relevant pedagogical approaches, related work, the underlying mind model used for MIXER agents as well as its innovative interaction interface utilising a tablet computer and a pictorial interaction language. We then consider the evaluation of the system, whether this shows it met its pedagogical objectives, and what can be learned from our results.</p

Claws and Controllers: Werewolves and Lycanthropy in Digital Games

Bridging a host of narrative and procedural genres, werewolves feature prominently in videogames as characters to control, enemies to kill, and allies to assist. Yet, despite the broad range of werewolf depictions found in games, there is a relative paucity of research examining how games depict werewolves and how these depictions relate to the mythos writ large. To address gamic werewolves specifically, this essay performs close readings of several games, notably The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (2006) and The Sims 2: Pets (2006). The readings are guided by the works of media scholars, including Alexander Galloway, Ian Bogost, Souvik Mukherjee, Tom Tyler and others. In analysing werewolf avatar gameplay, this essay proposes that some gamic werewolves encourage players to acknowledge and value animal alterity, human animality, and human-animal relations. Additionally, these werewolves foster ‘becomings’ for players, allowing them to understand hybridity and liminality experientially

Engaging Children in Interactive Application Evaluation

nteractive applications designed specifically for children offer great potential for education and play. However, to ascertain that the aims of applications are achieved, child-centred evaluations must be conducted. The design of any evaluation with children requires significant consideration of potential problems with comprehension, cognitive ability, response biases and study attrition. Multidisciplinary R&D project evaluation requirements are often extensive, requiring an all-encompassing and prolonged evaluation design. Discontinuity between the highly engaging interaction experience and themultitude of measures that form the evaluation poses a major issue for the evaluation of interactive applications. In response, we have developed Transmedia Evaluation, a method that aims to maintain engagement throughout the evaluation process. In this paper, the Transmedia Evaluation process is explained and applied to evaluate a learning application for children, MIXER (Moderating Interactions for Cross Cultural Empathic Relationships). Children aged 9-11 (N = 117) used the MIXER application and completed an evaluation battery including pre- and posttest questionnaires, immediate learning assessment and qualitative evaluation. Using Transmedia Evaluation to develop the MIXER evaluation resulted in complete data-sets (100%) for quantitative data (by self-regulated completion) along with rich, high quality qualitative responses. Transmedia Evaluation transformed the evaluation, with children fully engaging in and enjoying their experience. Engaging Children in Interactive Application Evaluation (PDF Download Available). Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/276422985_Engaging_Children_in_Interactive_Application_Evaluation [accessed Feb 8, 2016]

Interactive narration with a child: impact of prosody and facial expressions

International audienceIntelligent Virtual Agents are suitable means for interactive sto-rytelling for children. The engagement level of child interaction with virtual agents is a challenging issue in this area. However, the characteristics of child-agent interaction received moderate to little attention in scientific studies whereas such knowledge may be crucial to design specific applications. This article proposes a Wizard of Oz platform for interactive narration. An experimental study in the context of interactive story-telling exploiting this platform is presented to evaluate the impact of agent prosody and facial expressions on child participation during storytelling. The results show that the use of the virtual agent with prosody and facial expression modalities improves the engagement of children in interaction during the narrative sessions

Enhancing Questionnaire Design Through Participant Engagement to Improve the Outputs of Evaluation.

Questionnaires are habitual choices for many user experience evaluators, providing a well-recognised and accepted, fast and cost effective method of collecting and analysing data. However, despite frequent and widespread use in evaluation, reliance on questionnaires can be problematic. Satisficing, acquiescence bias and straight lining are common response biases associated with questionnaires, typically resulting in suboptimal responses and provision of poor quality data. These problems can relate to a lack of engagement with evaluation tasks, yet there is a lack of previous research that has attempted to alleviate these limitations by making questionnaires more fun or enjoyable to enhance participant engagement. This research seeks to address whether ‘user evaluation questionnaires can be designed to be engaging to improve optimal responding. The aim of this research is to investigate if response quality can be improved through enhancing questionnaire design both to reduce common response biases and to maintain participant engagement. The evaluation context for this study was provided by MIXER, an interactive, narrative-based application for intercultural sensitivity learning, used and evaluated by 9-11 year old children in the classroom context. A series of Participatory Design studies with children investigated engagement and optimal responding with questionnaires. These initial studies informed the design of a series of questionnaires created in the form of three workbooks that were used to evaluate MIXER with over 400 children. 3 A mixed methods approach was used to evaluate the questionnaires. Results demonstrate that by making questionnaire completion more enjoyable data quality is improved. Response biases are reduced, quantitative data are more complete and qualitative responses are more verbose and meaningful compared to standard questionnaires. Further, children reported that completing the questionnaires was a fun and enjoyable activity that they would wish to repeat in the future. As a discipline in its own right, evaluation is under-investigated. Similarly user evaluation is not evaluated with a lack of papers considering this issue in this millennium. Thus, this research provides a significant contribution to the field of evaluation, highlighting that the outputs of user evaluation with questionnaires are improved when participant engagement informs questionnaire design. The result is a more positive evaluation experience for participants and in return a higher standard of data provision for evaluators and R&D teams

Teacher experiences of critical thinking using supernaturally themed novels: implications for contemporary middle school classrooms

Through the collation of teacher experiences, this qualitative research focuses on the implications of critical thinking involving supernatural themes presented in school-based literature. With the imbedded supernatural themes in the religious belief systems of some cultural groups, our Indigenous population, and the Christian majority, the implications of the critical thinking emphasis endorsed by the Australian Curriculum and its application to thematic content in the middle school English classroom is investigated in this study. A cache of purposefully selected novels approved for use in Australian secondary schools are examined to determine the type and frequency of commonly occurring supernatural themes. These are then investigated to determine what types of cultural conflict could occur, and the subsequent impact the treatment of such themes could have on the personal belief systems and sensitivities of some groups in our multicultural society. Teacher perspectives are examined using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) methodology, and this research utilises hermeneutic principles to analyse the data gathered. This investigation reveals both positive and negative impacts on pedagogical practice, and highlights the ethical conflicts eliciting critical thinking responses using such thematic novels as a stimulus has on teachers in the 21st century classroom

How can I miss you if I don't know you're there?

How Can I Miss You if I Don’t Know You’re There? is an MFA thesis project that addresses the inevitable contradictions and tensions inherent in human/animal relationships. This work is a series of sculptural pieces installed using the tropes of museological methods of display and classification. Concentrating on invertebrates, I engage concepts like empathy, care and mothering in the context of these vilified subjects, contrary to the dominant dualisms characterized by Western, Christian, capitalist culture that hierarchize species. As I explore my entanglement with nonhuman others, attempts to convey affection blur with acts of unintentional subjugation as I implicate myself in the precarious balance between care and harm with respect to the use of living and dead organisms

Feminine Empowerment in Cathy Kelly’s Romance Novels Never Too Late, Someone Like You and Just Between Us

Tämän pro gradu -tutkielman tavoitteena on selvittää, kuinka Kelly ilmentää naispäähenkilöidensä kehittymistä ja voimaantumista kolmessa romaanissaan: Never Too Late (2000), Someone Like You (2001) ja Just Between Us (2003). Kehitys tapahtuu naisten henkilökohtaisen kehittymisen ja toiminnan kautta. Tutkielman lähtökohtana on, että Kellyn naispäähenkilöt ovat vapauttavia hahmoja, joiden kautta Kelly ilmentää ja edistää naisten vapautumista stereotyyppisistä rooleista ja patriarkaalisesta arvomaailmasta. Tutkielman teoriaosassa käsitellään kahta asiaa: ensiksi romanssikirjallisuuden lajia, sen määritelmää ja sisältöä sekä sen vapauttavaa merkitystä lukijoille. Tutkimuksen kohteena on myös romanssikirjallisuuden kehittyminen 1980-luvulta tähän päivään, erityisesti naispäähenkilön roolissa tapahtuneet muutokset. Toiseksi käsitellään romanssikirjallisuuden kaavamaisuutta sekä Kellyn romaaneissaan toistuvasti käyttämää kaavaa. Tutkimuksen kohteena ovat myös kirjallisten hahmojen luonnehdinta sekä hahmojen tulkinnassa tarvittava terminologia, erityisesti toiminnan käsite. Teoriaosasta saatujen tietojen ja käsitteiden perusteella analysoidaan Kellyn naispäähenkilöiden kehittymistä, itsenäistymistä ja vapautumista patriarkaalisista isä-tytär-suhteista sekä heidän oman aktiivisuutensa vaikutusta heidän elämissään tapahtuvissa muutoksissa. Tutkielman johtopäätös on, että Kellyn naispäähenkilöt itsenäistyvät ja kehittyvät romaanien kuluessa oman aktiivisuutensa ansiosta. Kellyn naispäähenkilöt voimaantuvat pääasiassa kahdella tavalla: selvittämällä ongelmalliset isä-tytär-suhteensa sekä turvautumalla naispuolisiin ystäviinsä. Ongelmalliset isä-tytär-suhteet, naisten tasapainoilu perinteisten ja nykyaikaisten naisihanteiden välillä sekä naisten välinen solidaarisuus ovat toistuvia teemoja Kellyn romaaneissa.fi=Opinnäytetyö kokotekstinä PDF-muodossa.|en=Thesis fulltext in PDF format.|sv=Lärdomsprov tillgängligt som fulltext i PDF-format

The Texts We Play: Avatar Creation and Racial Invisibility in Role-Playing Video Games

This project sets out to address problems of racial inequalities in role-playing video games as part of a growing field of video game studies in literary criticism. As these games are an increasingly popular form of entertainment in contemporary culture, their potential effects on players cannot be ignored. If these games continue to reflect society in a way that perpetuates racist stereotypes, social progress will halt. In order to study these games from a literary perspective, then, this project combines both narratological and ludological approaches to video game studies in order to bring about new insight from two strong perspectives. This method results in an in-depth analysis of selected role-playing games as texts as well as a survey of college students and how they approach the avatar creation process in video games as well as whether or not they perceive any racial imbalances. The study finds that most players do not consciously experience any racial imbalances and that roughly a third of the players surveyed have a conscious attachment to the avatars they create. In addition, the games analyzed are found to contain racially problematic elements, though some of these are more blatantly displayed in some games than in others. Overall, this project sets out to bring together two different approaches to game studies in order to legitimize projects like these for future use in the English discipline