Towards an Expressive Embodied Conversational Agent Utilizing Multi-Ethnicity to Augment Solution Focused Therapy

In this article, we present ongoing research, EMO, an affective embodied conversational agent platform, aimed at depicting multi-ethnic, multi-modal communication patterns in a credible manner. We employ the methodology of integrating counseling concepts early in the design to effectively target a specific domain. The system is geared to augment solution focused therapy. We present a prototype of the architecture as proof of concept and evaluate the platform for affect portrayal.