Page 22 - Socially Intelligent Agents Creating Relationships with Computers and Robots

Creating Relationships with Computers and Robots 5

can we design and implement agents that engage in and maintain relationships
with users? How will we be able to provide and to manage such agents?
There are a number of dimensions of analysis of this problem, such as:

What interaction methods and protocols are efficacious?

What kinds of information should be exchanged?
What knowledge can be and should be shared?

How do we model the other?

– How should a computer agent model the human?
– How will the human user model or think of the computer agent?
What kinds of constraints on behavior of both partners can result, how do
we represent them, communicate them, detect them, renegotiate them?
and
What are the effects, benefits and drawbacks of agent-human relation-
ships?
Chapter 2, written by Per Persson, Jarmo Laaksolahti, and Peter Lönnqvist
presents a social psychological view of agent-human relationships, drawing on
their backgrounds in cultural studies and film. They observe that users adopt
an intentional instead of mechanical attitude in understanding socially intelli-
gent agents, pointing out the active role of the human mind in constructing a
meaningful reality. According to their constructivist approach, socially intelli-
gent agents must be meaningful, consistent and coherent to the user. In order
to characterize this mentality, the authors draw upon a comprehensive back-
ground including folk psychology and trait theory. They advocate the use of
folk theories of intelligence in agent design, however this will be idiosyncratic
to the user and their particular culture.
In chapter 3, Alan Bond discusses an implemented computer model of a
socially intelligent agent, and its dynamics of relationships between agents and
between humans and agents. He establishes two main properties of his model
which he suggests are necessary for agent-human relationships. The first is
voluntary action and engagement: agents, and humans, must act voluntarily
and autonomously. The second is mutual control: in a relationship humans
and agents must exert some control over each other. The conciliation of these
two principles is demonstrated by his model, since agents voluntarily enter into
mutually controlling regimes.
Bruce Edmonds presents in chapter 4 a very interesting idea that might be
usable for creating socially intelligent agents. He suggests that agents be cre-
ated using a developmental loop including the human user. The idea is for