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Should Agents Speak Like, um, Humans? The Use of Conversational Fillers by Virtual Agents

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Intelligent Virtual Agents (IVA 2009)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNAI,volume 5773))

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Abstract

We describe the design and evaluation of an agent that uses the fillers um and uh in its speech. We describe an empirical study of human-human dialogue, analyzing gaze behavior during the production of fillers and use this data to develop a model of agent-based gaze behavior. We find that speakers are significantly more likely to gaze away from their dialogue partner while uttering fillers, especially if the filler occurs at the beginning of a speaking turn. This model is evaluated in a preliminary experiment. Results indicate mixed attitudes towards an agent that uses conversational fillers in its speech.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Northeastern University College of Computer and Information Science, 202 WVH, 360 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA, 02115, USA

    Laura M. Pfeifer & Timothy Bickmore

Authors
  1. Laura M. Pfeifer
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  2. Timothy Bickmore
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Human Media Interaction (HMI), University of Twente, EWI (Zilverling), P.O.Box 217, 7500, Enschede, AE, The Netherlands

    Zsófia Ruttkay

  2. Deutsches Forschungszentrum für künstliche Intelligenz (DFKI), Campus D3.2, 66123, Saarbrücken, Germany

    Michael Kipp

  3. Human Media Interaction Group,Dept. of Computer Science, University of Twente, P.O. Box 217, 7500, Enschede, AE, The Netherlands

    Anton Nijholt

  4. Center for Analysis and Design of Intelligent Agents, CADIA, School of Computer Science, Reykjavik University, Kringlan 1, 103, Reykjavik, Iceland

    Hannes Högni Vilhjálmsson

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© 2009 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Pfeifer, L.M., Bickmore, T. (2009). Should Agents Speak Like, um, Humans? The Use of Conversational Fillers by Virtual Agents. In: Ruttkay, Z., Kipp, M., Nijholt, A., Vilhjálmsson, H.H. (eds) Intelligent Virtual Agents. IVA 2009. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 5773. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-04380-2_50

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-04380-2_50

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-04379-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-04380-2

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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