Agent vs. Avatar: Comparing Embodied Conversational Agents Concerning Characteristics of the Uncanny Valley

TL;DR

This study compares autonomous and face-tracked ECAs to understand how appearance influences eeriness and attractiveness, confirming that more human-like ECAs can evoke feelings of eeriness regardless of participant demographics.

Contribution

It provides empirical evidence on how different types of ECAs are perceived in terms of humanness, eeriness, and attractiveness, especially regarding the uncanny valley effect.

Findings

Increased perceived humanness correlates with increased eeriness.

Gender and age do not significantly affect the uncanny valley response.

Female ECAs are perceived as more attractive than male ECAs.

Abstract

Visual appearance is an important aspect influencing the perception and consequent acceptance of Embodied Conversational Agents (ECA). To this end, the Uncanny Valley theory contradicts the common assumption that increased humanization of characters leads to better acceptance. Rather, it shows that anthropomorphic behavior may trigger feelings of eeriness and rejection in people. The work presented in this paper explores whether four different autonomous ECAs, specifically build for a European research project, are affected by this effect, and how they compare to two slightly more realistically looking human-controlled, i.e. face-tracked, ECAs with respect to perceived humanness, eeriness, and attractiveness. Short videos of the ECAs in combination with a validated questionnaire were used to investigate potential differences. Results support existing theories highlighting that increased perceived humanness correlates with increased perceived eeriness. Furthermore, it was found, that neither the gender of survey participants, their age, nor the sex of the ECA influences this effect, and that female ECAs are perceived to be significantly more attractive than their male counterparts.