Face Value — Why Bots Need Faces

(Co-Authored with Ryann Stevenson Wahl, 8 October, 2016)

Some of the most powerful and innovative companies in the world, like Mattel, American Express, Xerox, AT&T and Toys R Us, among others, have integrated the use of avatars into their products, services, and business models. Critical for advanced human-computer interaction (HCI), avatars have become an integral part of our present and future media landscape. We’re talking about a bot with a face. Because bots need faces to better communicate. The face is, like an interface, a communication method.

WHY AVATARS?

Information is more effectively exchanged between faces, causing a significant increase in neural synchronization. The need for face-to-face interaction is reinforced every day in misunderstandings via emails, text messages, and phone calls in our personal lives and in the workplace. One study showed that email recipients identified the correct intended tone of the sender only 56% of the time. This is not acceptable for efficient communication. According to Forbes, 93% of communication effectiveness comes from non-verbal cues. Talking face-to-face is the only mode of communication that eliminates the most error. But we don’t always have time for this. So we create a simulation of face-to-face interaction.

Using avatars to represent physical bodies in physical spaces introduces more opportunities for clear communication by supplying important information that couldn’t otherwise be easily obtained. Information like identity, location, capacity, activity, availability, attention, and presence can all be relayed by the use of an avatar the way a human body would in real life.

REALISM VS. HUMANISM

While it’s been found that human-like qualities in avatars are beneficial, studies have shown that photorealism isn’t as important as body language. Microsoft conducted the study in which they explored the limitations of text-based chats versus graphical chats. The main difference they found was in the availability of non-verbal cues in avatars, which holds high currency in the business of conversation. Their findings conveyed that participants who used an avatar while chatting returned to the chat space significantly more often than the traditional text chat users.

Regardless of how photorealistic an avatar looks (and avatars should not look photorealistic, but we’ll get to that later), interaction with an avatar can be as effective — and in some use cases even more effective — as interaction with a human. In addition to this, avatars have been proven to imbue users with feelings such as empathy, trust, fear, and other emotions in much the same way as in-person interaction, or television and movies. In return, users have been highly receptive to feelings expressed by avatars, and empathetic behavior of avatars reduced stress while interacting with it.

APPLIED USE

The American Psychological Association stands behind the abundance of research suggesting the benefits of using avatars in therapy and business. We’re seeing more and more experts using avatars for clinical purposes. Microsoft’s chief researcher and strategy officer used avatars on Xbox Kinect to lead group therapy sessions under the hypothesis that patients will feel less intimidated by an avatar. Since 2009 Cisco Systems has been using an avatar, Patty, to council hospital patients in order to receive important information that people might be too embarrassed to divulge otherwise. Studies have shown that intimate self-disclosure is 80% more likely when humans are interacting with avatars, and that this is mainly due to a combination of perceived anonymity, fear of being judged, and non-verbal behavior.

A report from Gartner Research stated that the use of avatars increases customer relationships, improves business methods, and helps to target markets. Bonita Stewart, formerly head of interactive marketing for Jeep, Chrysler, and Dodge car brands, has said that avatars create an opportunity for sustained engagement with a product compared to basic click-through engagement. The point to this isn’t about paper, digital media, or distribution. It’s about basic communication. It’s about faces.

CONCLUSION

Whether you’re talking with a best friend, colleague, therapist, or customer, shoddy communication can cause fatal miscommunications leading to damaged relationships, neglected health, or the loss of a business opportunity. The most necessary communication will always be the most human communication.

And, let’s face it, that requires a face.