A systematic narrative review of agent persona on learning outcomes and design variables to enhance personification

Abstract

Early researchers suggested that virtual humans (animated pedagogical agents) required a persona if they were to be anthropomorphized by the user. Over the past two decades, research has focused on design features that target the perception of persona in order to increase the anthropomorphization of the agent toward the end of increased learning outcomes. This systematic narrative review analyzes studies that have measured agent persona using the Agent Persona Instrument to assess whether there is evidence that persona increases learning outcomes. Our findings suggest that significantly higher persona ratings have little effect on learning outcomes. However, design features such as facial expressions and gestures were more important moderators of agent persona than voice and agent type, and environmental details such as study domain or student population suggested no clear direction in the perception of persona. The article concludes with a discussion of future directions for study designs and potential frontiers.

Keywords:

• Pedagogical agent
• agent persona
• Agent Persona Instrument
• embodiment
• facial expressions
• gestures

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Robert O. Davis

Robert O. Davis is an associate professor in the Department of English Linguistics and Language Technology at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies. His current research interests involve pedagogical agent gesturing, social acceptance of virtual characters, interaction with computer-based environments, and virtual reality in the foreign language classroom.

Taejung Park

Taejung Park is an assistant professor in the Division of Liberal Arts at the College of Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies, Kyonggi University in Suwon, Republic of Korea. She received her master’s degree in multimedia English education from Ewha Graduate School of Education, and her Ph.D. in educational technology from Seoul National University. Her current research interests focus on instructional design, MOOCs (massive open online courses), augmented reality/virtual reality/mixed reality (AR/VR/MR)-based learning, maker education, creative problem solving, and future school.

Joseph Vincent

Joseph Vincent is an associate professor in the Department of English for International Conferences and Communication at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies. His current research interests involve mixed media learning and teaching.