Inconsistency in Behaviors of Virtual Agents and Robots: Case Studies on its Influences into Dialogues with Humans

Inconsistency in behaviors of virtual agents and robots, like that between utterance contents, utterance forms, and postures, has a possibility of influences into human impression, cognition, and memory, and as a result, may lead to inhibition of dialogues between humans and these artifacts. In order to discuss about this possibility and its implications on dialogue design, this paper introduces some case studies using simple animated characters and a small-sized humanoid robot in Japan.