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‘What I see is not what you get’

Integrating culture into the behavioural models of virtual characters requires knowledge from very different disciplines such as cross-cultural psychology and computer science. If culture-related behavioural differences are simulated with a virtual character system, users might not necessarily understand the intent of the designer. This is, in part, due to the influence of culture on not only users, but also designers. To gain a greater understanding of the instantiation of culture in the behaviour of virtual characters, and on this potential mismatch between designer and user, we have conducted two experiments. In these experiments, we tried to simulate one dimension of culture (Masculinity vs. Femininity) in the behaviour of virtual characters. We created four scenarios in the first experiment and six in the second. In each of these scenarios, the same two characters interact with each other. The verbal and non-verbal behaviour of these characters differs depending on their cultural scripts. In two user perception studies, we investigated how these differences are judged by human participants with different cultural backgrounds. Besides expected differences between participants from Masculine and Feminine countries, we found significant differences in perception between participants from Individualistic and Collectivistic countries. We also found that the user’s interpretation of the character’s motivation had a significant influence on the perception of the scenarios. Based on our findings, we give recommendations for researchers that aim to design culture-specific behaviours for virtual characters.

Designing chatbots for training professionals in child and youth social care

Introduction:Various subjects in child and youth social care, such as sexuality and sexual violence, are quite sensitive, and professionals may experience a certain reluctance to discuss these subjects with their clients (e.g., the young people they work with, as well as their families) and colleagues. An example of such a subject is sexual abuse and unacceptable behavior that may occur with their clients, whether at home, at the youth care institution or somewhere else.It is essential that youth care professionals do not shy away from such a sensitive subject as sexual abuse and know how to talk about it with their clients in a healthy way. Professionals in child and youth social care should dare to educate on this topic, and be trained to deal with the enormous diversity of young people and parents they encounter in their work.Research on application of trained methods shows that receiving training on itself is often not enough to develop strong applicable competences about subjects like sexual abuse and to continue to apply these acquired practical skills in the field in the long term. In order to be able to apply ‘what is learned’ successfully, it is necessary to practice the learned skills in a safe environment, and to regularly refresh those skills. In order to create an opportunity for practicing skills in a safe environment, we have explored the extent to which innovative chatbot technologies can be used to better equip (future) professionals to apply and practice their skills.

Designing Game-Based Learning for Training Metacognition

The digital skills divide: evidence from the European tourism industry

Purpose: This paper aims to present the findings from a European study on the digital skills gaps in tourism and hospitality companies. Design/methodology/approach: Mixed methods research was adopted. The sample includes 1,668 respondents (1,404 survey respondents and 264 interviewees) in 5 tourism sectors (accommodation establishments, tour operators and travel agents, food and beverage, visitor attractions and destination management organisations) in 8 European countries (UK, Italy, Ireland, Spain, Hungary, Germany, the Netherlands and Bulgaria). Findings: The most important future digital skills include online marketing and communication skills, social media skills, MS Office skills, operating systems use skills and skills to monitor online reviews. The largest gaps between the current and the future skill levels were identified for artificial intelligence and robotics skills and augmented reality and virtual reality skills, but these skills, together with computer programming skills, were considered also as the least important digital skills. Three clusters were identified on the basis of their reported gaps between the current level and the future needs of digital skills. The country of registration, sector and size shape respondents’ answers regarding the current and future skills levels and the skills gap between them. Originality/value: The paper discusses the digital skills gap of tourism and hospitality employees and identifies the most important digital skills they would need in the future.

Youth Care Knowledge Exchange through Online simulation gaming

A case study and method development research of online simulation gaming to enhance youth care knowlegde exchange. Youth care professionals affirm that the application used has enough relevance as an additional tool for knowledge construction about complex cases. They state that the usability of the application is suitable, however some remarks are given to adapt the virtual environment to the special needs of youth care knowledge exchange. The method of online simulation gaming appears to be useful to improve network competences and to explore the hidden professional capacities of the participant as to the construction of situational cognition, discourse participation and the accountability of intervention choices.

Defining fabric drape

This research aims to obtain more insight in the perception of fabric drape and how fabric drape can be cat-egorized With the current 3D virtual technologies to simulate garments the fashion and clothing industry can speed up work processes, improve accuracy and reduce material consumption in fit, design and sales. Although the interest in 3D technology is increasing, the implementation on a large scale emerges only slowly. At the threshold between physical and virtual fitting the fashion industry faces new challenges and demands re-quiring responses out of rule. The measurement of fabric drape started in the first half of the previous cen-tury, after the introduction of 3D garment simulation fabric drape gained interest from more researchers to obtain information for the virtual drape. Intensive research has been undertaken to define ‘fabric hand’, however, research is limited for the definition of fabric drape. Better understanding of how fabrics drape and how they can be selected based on their drape might contribute to the understanding of the virtually as-sessed material and accelerate the selection process of virtually, as well as digitally presented fabrics. For this research the drape coefficient of 13 fabrics, selected based on their drape, was measured with the Cusick drape tester. Images and videos of the fabrics draped on pedestals were presented to an expert tex-tile panel who were asked to define the fabric drape. From these definitions categories, as well as identifying key-words, were derived. During a group session the expert panel evaluated the drape categories and identi-fying key-words. In the next phase an expert user panel, familiar with the assessment of fabrics in a virtual environment, assessed the appropriateness of the categories and identifying key-words which were present-ed along with the fabric drape images and videos. Moreover, both panels judged the stiffness and amount of drape, next to that they indicated similar draping fabrics. The relation between the subjective assessment of drape and the drape coefficient was investigated. The agreement of the user panel with the drape categories defined and evaluated by the textile panel was high. Further, the agreement of the majority of the user panel with the identifying key-words was above 78%. A strong relation was found between the measured drape coefficient and the subjectively assessed stiffness and amount of drape. Additionally, the analysis of the fabrics combined by the panels based on drape simi-larity, as well as the analysis of the drape coefficients, confirms with previous research, that significantly dif-ferent fabrics can have a similar drape. Fabrics can be divided in drape categories based on the way they drape, and the identifying key-words are useful to distinguish between significantly different fabrics with similar fabric drape. Moreover, the cate-gories are related to the drape coefficient.