Perceptions of Personality in Computer Agents: Effects of Culture and Gender

Abstract

Developing computer agents with personalities may be one way to enhance human-machine collaboration. To create computer agents with personalities it is essential to identify the actions, language, and/or behaviors that people indicate signify the personalities they perceive. Additionally it is possible that culture and gender may play a role in how computer personalities are perceived. This research investigated how culture and gender affect the perception of computer personalities within a computer game. Participants were asked to rate the computer characters in a blackjack game based on the Big Five Factor personality trait model and to describe the actions, language, and/or behaviors that gave them their impressions. The results show that participants did perceive personality in the computer characters and were able to describe actions, languages and behaviors leading to their perceptions. The results indicated that there were no statistically significant differences based on culture and gender differences. This research provides a starting point for development of computer agents with personalities incorporating personality theory into model development.

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