How am I? Guidelines for Animated Interface Agents Evaluation

The area of animated interface agents is related to the development of applications that aim to improve human- computer interaction process using software agents represented by characters or human figures. Although several projects are being developed in this area, there isn ´t a method to describe criteria that ought to be considered to evaluate animated interface agents. This paper proposes basic guidelines for animated agents evaluation based on concepts provided by artificial intelligence (AI) and human-computer interaction (HCI). We believe that the proposed guidelines could help both AI (to project and to develop agents that can enhance human- agent usability) and HCI researchers (to evaluate animated interface agents).