Toward Usage of Avatar Interviewers in Web Surveys
Imagine one morning in the near future a fellow named Dave arrives at his office and begins reading his email to prioritize tasks for the work day ahead. One message contains an embedded video. He clicks on the play button and sees an animated human head speaking with a human voice that asks him to click on a link to a survey. Normally, he would move on to other messages and return to do the survey later, but today he decides to complete the survey immediately because he is curious about the animated character. After Dave clicks on the link, he notices the same character he saw in the email is now visible from the waist up and is in a seated position. Text, appearing as a text bubble in a comic strip, states that her name is Pat, and she asks the employee to turn on his webcam and speakers if he has them. His computer is equipped with a webcam, microphone, and speakers, so he switches them on. Pat asks Dave to say or click a button labeled “begin the survey.” Usually, Dave does not speak to his computer, but no one else is in the office yet so he decides to continue by saying “begin the survey.”