Panel on
Artificial
Agents for Psychotherapy
March 27, 2008
Computer-assisted psychotherapy represents a major new
development in clinical practice and is expected to play an increasingly important
role over the next 10 years. Use of computers in therapy ranges from relatively
simple communication-support tools, to the use of complex simulation environment
and synthetic agents. Computer-mediated communication (CMC) has already entered
the counselor's practice, in the form of internet communication, email and video-conferencing.
The particular focus of this panel is the use of more sophisticated computer
technologies; specifically, the use of synthetic virtual agents and simulated
virtual environments. The success of existing virtual environments to treat
phobias and PTSD suggests further exploration of this technology, in the form
of virtual synthetic agents which could play a variety of roles. These include
social therapeutic companions for supportive therapies, participants in interactive
models of internal dramas or conflicts for psychodynamic therapies, and coaches
and ‘practice partners’ for cognitive-behavioral therapies.
The panel will focus on interdisciplinary discussion among panelists specialized
in various sub-disciplines necessary for the creation of artificial agents for
use in psychotherapeutic interventions. We plan to invite experts representing
the relevant areas of Psychology (Emotion, Personality, Belief and Behavioral
Change), Clinical Psychology and Social Work (Psychodynamic, Cognitive-Behavioral,
and Eclectic therapies), and Computer Science (Artificial Intelligence, Intelligent
User Interfaces, Embodied Conversational Characters, Interactive Narratives,
Computer Persuasion).
The panel will focus specifically on questions to help
advance the use of computer technologies for therapeutic simulation and companionship
(vs. issues in CMC-assisted psychotherapy) such as:
• Are there specific types of therapeutic approaches and diagnostic categories
that would particularly benefit from the use of agent technologies?
• Are there therapeutic approaches, or diagnostic categories, for which
agent technologies are inappropriate or contraindicated?
• What is the best means of integrating synthetic agents into the therapeutic
practice, and how does this vary depending on the therapeutic model and diagnosis?
• What are the main features and functionalities required for computer-assisted
psychotherapy?
• To what extent does the current state-of-the-art in embodied conversational
agents and social dialogue support the development of these functionalities?
What new developments are required to achieve the necessary degree of realism
required for psychotherapy?
• What essential aspect of embodiment would need to be incorporated in such ECA (empathy, non-verbal behaviors, personality traits, ethnicity, social dialogue)?
• What would be the expected impact of using Embodied Conversational Agents
(ECAs) as the interface for computer-assisted psychotherapeutic systems, compared
to an interface without an ECA.
• Which advances in cognitive and affective models, and agent architectures,
can be exploited for the construction of the therapeutic agents and what additional
advances need to be achieved?
• How can the recent? progress? in interactive narrative research be used
to help this endeavor?
• What are the ethical questions that need to be addressed by researchers
and practitioners?
• What are the pragmatic and cultural issues that must be addressed to
facilitate the integration of synthetic agents into existing clinical practices?
Paper summarizing the panel objectives and the panelists' postion statements.
Panelists
Compuer-assisted
and computer-mediated psychotherapy is an emerging discipline and necessarily
a highly-interdisciplinary
endeavour. In this panel we have therefore invited participants from the key
contributing disciplines: clinical practice,
agent architecures, virtual reality, AI and cognitive science.
Diane M.
Hodge, Ph.D., LCSW is an Associate Professor and the Interim Director for the
School of Social Work at Radford University. She teaches graduate practice and
theory courses,
and her research interests include evidenced-based social work practice, rural
mental health practice,
women's issues, and technology in social work education. She is a licensed clinical
social worker (VA)
who specializes in working with depressed, anxious, and chronically mentally
ill clients in both outpatient
and inpatient settings.
Professor
Ana Paiva is a research group leader at INESC-ID and an Associate Professor
at
Instituto Superior Técnico, Technical University of Lisbon. She is well
known in the area of
Intelligent Agents, Artificial Intelligence Applied to Education and Affective
Computing.
After her PhD in the UK (University of Lancaster), she has worked in Germany
(in GMD)
and in France (CNRS-COAST team at the ENS of Lyon). In 1996 she returned to
Portugal
where she created a group on intelligent agents and synthetic characters (GAIPS).
Her research is focused on the affective elements in the interactions between
users and computers.
She served as a member of numerous international conference and workshops. She
has (co)authored
over 80 publications in refereed journals, conferences and books. She co-ordinated
the participation
of INESC in several European projects, such as the IDEALS (funded under the
Telematics program),
NIMIS (an I3-ESE project), DiViLab and Safira (IST- 5th Framework), where she
was the
prime contractor, VICTEC, COLDEX, MindRaces and E-Circus (in the 6th framework).
Albert “Skip”
Rizzo received his Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the State University of
New York at Binghamton.
He is a Research Scientist at the University of Southern California Institute
for Creative Technologies and is a
Research Professor appointment with the USC Dept. of Psychiatry and the School
of Gerontology. Dr. Rizzo conducts
research on the design, development and evaluation of Virtual Reality systems
targeting the areas of clinical assessment,
treatment and rehabilitation, in the domains of cognitive, motor and psychological
functioning. In the psychological domain,
his latest project has focused on the translation of the graphic assets from
the Xbox game, Full Spectrum Warrior,
into an exposure therapy application for combat-related PTSD with Iraq War veterans.
Additionally, he is conducting
research on VR applications that use 360 Degree Panoramic video for exposure
therapy (social phobia), role-playing
applications (anger management, etc.). He is also investigating the use of VR
for pain distraction at LA
Children’s Hospital and is currently designing game-based VR scenarios
to address issues of concern with
children having autistic spectrum disorder. In the area of Gerontology, Dr.
Rizzo has served as the program
director of the USC Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center and is the creator
of the Memory Enhancement
Seminars for Seniors (MESS) program at the USC School of Gerontology. He is
the associate editor of the
journals, CyberPsychology and Behavior; and The International Journal of Virtual
Reality, is Senior Editor of the
MIT Press journal, Presence: Teleoperators and Virtual Environments, is on a
number of editorial boards for journals
in the areas of cognition and computer technology (Cognitive Technology; Journal
of Computer Animation and
Virtual Worlds; Media Psychology) and is the creator of the Virtual Reality
Mental Health Email Listserve (VRPSYCH).
He has recently guest-edited theme issues for Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback
on “VR and Psychophysiology”,
two new journal issues on “Virtual Rehabilitation” (in CyberPsychology
and Behavior and in the International Journal on
Disability and Human Development) and one for the MIT journal Presence:Teleoperators
and Virtual Environments on
"Virtual Reality and Neuropsychology". Previously, he guest edited
a theme issue in CyberPsychology and Behavior
on “Aging and Information Technology”. He served as General Chair
for the IEEE VR2003 conference in Los Angeles
and co-chaired this conference in 2004. He was also the Conference Chair of
the 4th Annual Workshop on
Virtual Rehabilitation on Catalina Island, Los Angeles in Sept. of 2005. In
his spare time, he plays rugby,
listens to music and rides his motorcycle.
Eric Wagner
is a Professor at Florida International University, where he directs the Community-Based
Intervention
Research Group (C-BIRG). C-BIRG an interdisciplinary research group devoted
to the design, implementation,
and evaluation of community-based interventions for adolescent substance use
and related problems. Dr. Wagner
earned his doctoral degree in Clinical Psychology from the University of Pittsburgh,
completed a post-doctoral fellowship
at the Brown University Center for Alcohol and Addiction Studies, and is a licensed
psychologist in the States of Florida
and Rhode Island. His interests are in the areas of adolescent substance abuse
and the empirical evaluation of
community-based psychotherapeutic interventions. An increasing area of focus
has been developing and testing
interventions for adolescent substance use problems among Hispanic teens. Dr.
Wagner has published numerou
s articles, chapters, and two edited books in his areas of interest, and he
has been the Principal Investigator or a
Co-Investigator on nine NIH-funded research grants. He was recognized for his
early career achievements with
the New Investigator Award from the Sixth International Conference on Treatment
of Addictive Behaviors, as well as
being selected to present at the Symposium in Honor of Enoch Gordis at the 25th
Annual Scientific Meeting of the
Research Society on Alcoholism.
Panelist Presentations
Skip
Rizzo
Panel Organizers