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Abstract

This comment discusses work by Aylett and Paiva (2012) which describes a synthetic approach to building a virtual world inhabited by synthetic characters where the user can experience subjective culture, that is, the experience of social reality, and learn how to empathetically communicate with people in other cultures. It provides a computational theory for integrating recent findings on emotion and cultural sensitivities into an interactive drama played by interacting characters with varying personalities. The FAtiMA-PSI, the implementation of their theory, has advanced a critical step towards basing affective intelligence on a firmer ground. Future challenges include building an empathic agent on the simulated physiology level that can be recognized as an independent ego with its own personality and presence.

Keywords

bodily feedback intercultural empathy subjective culture virtual characters

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