This paper presents an empirical investigation of the extent to which spoken Humanoid Embodied Conversational Agents (HECAs) can foster usability in mobile serious game (MSG) applications. The aim of the research is to assess the impact of multiple agents and illusion of humanness on the quality of the interaction. The experiment investigates two styles of agent presentation: an agent of high human-likeness (HECA) and an agent of low human-likeness (text). The purpose of the experiment is to assess whether and how agents of high humanlikeness can evoke the illusion of humanness and affect usability. Agents of high human-likeness were designed by following the ECA design model that is a proposed guide for ECA development. The results of the experiment with 90 participants show that users prefer to interact with the HECAs. The difference between the two versions is statistically significant with a large effect size (d=1.01), with many of the participants justifying their choice by saying that the human-like characteristics of the HECA made the version more appealing. This research provides key information on the potential effect of HECAs on serious games, which can provide insight into the design of future mobile serious games.

翻译：本文通过实证研究探讨了口语化人形具身对话代理（HECAs）在移动严肃游戏（MSG）应用中促进可用性的程度。研究旨在评估多代理及拟人性幻觉对交互质量的影响。实验考察了两种代理呈现形式：高拟人性代理（HECA）与低拟人性代理（文本）。实验目的在于评估高拟人性代理是否以及如何唤起拟人性幻觉并影响可用性。高拟人性代理依据ECA设计模型（一项针对ECA开发的指导性框架）进行设计。基于90名参与者的实验结果表明，用户更倾向于与HECA进行交互。两个版本之间的差异在统计上显著且效应量较大（d=1.01），众多参与者将其选择归因于HECA的拟人特征提升了版本的吸引力。本研究为HECA对严肃游戏的潜在影响提供了关键信息，可为未来移动严肃游戏的设计提供启示。