Name: __________________________________ Yr.

, Course & Section: ________________________

Instructor: _______________________________ Date: _______________ Rating: ______________

Chapter 5
Emotional Interaction

A. Direction: Look at a website that has a virtual assistant, e.g. Anna at Ikea.com, Jenn at Alaskaair.com
and answer the following questions:
1. What does the virtual agent do?
2. What type of agent is it?
3. Does it elicit an emotional response from you? If so, what kind?
4. What kind of personality does it have?
5. How is this expressed?
6. What kind of behavior does it exhibit?
7. What are its facial expressions like?
8. What is its appearance like? Is it realistic or cartoon-like?
9. Where does it appear on the screen?
10. How does it communicate with the user (text or speech)?
11. Is the level of discourse patronizing or at the right level?
12. Is the agent helpful in guiding the user towards making a purchase or finding out something?
13. Is it too pushy?
14. What gender is it? Do you think this makes a difference?
15. Would you trust the agent to the extent that you would be happy to buy a product from it or follow
its guidance? If not, why not?
16. What else would it take to make the agent persuasive?

B. Next, look at an equivalent website that does not include an agent but is based on a conceptual model
of browsing, e.g. Amazon.com. How does it compare with the agent-based site you have just looked at?
1. Is it easy to find information?
2. What kind of mechanism does the site use to make recommendations and guide the user in making a
purchase or finding out information?
3. Is any kind of personalization used at the interface to make the user feel welcome or special?
4. Would the site be improved by having an agent? Explain your reasons either way.

C. Finally, discuss which site you would trust most and give your reasons for this.
Name: __________________________________ Yr., Course & Section: ________________________
Instructor: _______________________________ Date: _______________ Rating: ______________

Chapter 5
Emotional Interaction

Answers:
A.
1. A virtual agent is somewhat like of an assistant that assists any people who visits any webpage on
which any Virtual Agent are assigned, their job is to persuade any visitors/customers who are visiting
their webpage in order to gain their attention, emotion, and feelings which in return would lead to any
visitors wanting to visit their webpage even more frequently.
2. Well it can be mainly called as a Virtual Agent since their main task is to assist any visitors that are
visiting their website if they find it hard to locate something and needing some help then clearly a
Virtual Assistant is the one who fits in this type of job.
3. Yes it did elicit some emotional response from me, and as my observation is concern I found out that
Virtual Assistants helps any users/visitors of any website/webpages to be more familiar on the things
that are present within a certain site, which would clearly result in a good service and then leads to a
very great satisfaction of the user or me.
4. The personality that any Virtual Assistant are having would be the following: they’re calm, helpful,
cheerful, knowledgeable, and good in entertaining visitors/users that visits their webpage/sites.
5. Virtual Assistants are expressing their thoughts and opinions in a way which would help and has a
relation to the concern of every visitors/users that are present in their webpages/sites, somewhat like by
telling the user on what to do in order to resolve some issues which pertains to its problems and many
more.
6. The kind of behavior that a Virtual Assistant exhibits are kind, cheerful, and reliable behavior which
would make them to be more enjoyable companion, and a more reliable assistant in any site.
7. Some Virtual Assistants are having facial expressions which helps them to persuade the feelings of
their users/visitors, some of those facial expressions are as follows: smiling face, entertaining face, and
some face which has the potential to get the attention of any users/visitors of any webpages/sites.
8. In terms of appearance Virtual Assistants comes in 2: Realistic and Cartoon-like, this is because every
people has its own preferred graphical interests which makes them more comfortable and by having both
types of Virtual Assistant then any webpages/sites claims for being user friendly can be justified.
9. Information’s about Virtual Assistants can be found somewhere within any webpages/sites but it is
usually located within the sides of any sites where people can immediately locate it without any hassle,
because any webpages/sites must be designed to be user friendly and that’s the reason why any
information’s which relates to a Virtual Assistant must be presented or should be present within the side
of a webpage.
10. Virtual Assistants communicate with every visitors/users in both ways, text and speech, this is
because a customer has the high chance to be persuaded when they see someone talking and presenting
them something which makes them to be more curious of the things that they’re offering or presenting to
their customers.
11. In my opinion the discourse level of any sites that should give to their users/customers should be on
the right level and should not exceed far beyond that because anything that is too much would really
irritate someone which would result to them avoiding those things which will then lead in low sales and
etc.
12. Yes, I absolutely agree that agents are giving a great and massive help in terms of sales and lending
help to their customers for it has really far been proven that by using Virtual Agents any webpages/sites
are already generating high incomes most especially with the presence of new technologies combined
with the massive innovation of internet then I would really strongly agree that agents are doing a great
job in giving good result on each companies that they’re in.
13. Virtual Agents are not that pushy because I do believe that their great experience, skills, and abilities
are all aligned and designed to fit on the work which relates to selling, lending helps to every customers,
and many more which relates to technology.
14. As far as my concern is, I do believe that gender will never be an issue in terms of making a
difference in the field of virtual agents for it is not the gender that will give the result but it is the skills,
ability, and experience that will give the great result, and that’s why I would strongly disagree that
gender will make a difference because it has already been proven nowadays with all these appearing
multiple genders.
15. In my own opinion I think it would just depend on the agent if they and the customer they’re serving
are having some correlation then that would give a great result in the customer to buy any products on
that site but if the Virtual Agent and the customer does not have any correlational similarities then
chances would be low.
16. In terms of persuasion, I think the agents should be more presentable, and must obtain the ability
which would persuade their customer even more, like the following: sales talking skills, and many skills
which relates to business and advertising experiences, this way Virtual Agents can persuade their
customer even higher than a regular Agent does.

B.
1. In my own experience I find it more easy to find information in the conceptual model of browsing
other than the one that was presented previously but I do believe that there are also some people who
prefers to use the other type of model that was presented previously which suits to their needs, but
overall both the model was user-friendly.
2. Both sites used some mechanisms which persuades the user to purchase their products through
showing pictures of the actual product and showing the price of each product, and by displaying all the
information’s available in relation to the product they’re selling.
3. Yes, they used some personalization which would literally fit to the mood, and needs of their
customer/user in a way which would let the user feeling free to see and check anything that they’re
interested on checking with, and both sites are doing such by giving all the information’s of the products
available which fits base on the needs and moods of the users.
4. Yes, absolutely a site would drastically have an improvement if they will hire some Agents which will
assist all their customers, because agents role are crucial in building up a good system which satisfies the
customers’ needs and makes them to come back at any time as they pleased.

C.
1. For me I would literally be going to trust Amazon because of the service that they’re providing to
their customer, and also base on my observation I observed that Amazon has literally gotten the
attention of most customers due to their massive Campaign Ads which helps their company to reach
even those people who are far away partnered with their Delivery services they absolutely have a good
system, and I would also suggest that they too should start to hire some Virtual Agents because as time
goes by it cannot be denied that their customers are growing drastically, with the help of Agents they
can have a better more system which would address the concerns of any customers.