Coupling Cognitive Agents

The research program aims at translating theories in cognitive psychology, human-computer interaction, machine learning, and language models to design intelligent agents (including multi-agent environments) that support individual and group human behavior (such as learning, decision-making, health behavior, ideation creation) for adults across the lifespan.

Projects

Current Projects

  • Developing cognitive generative agents with theory-driven memory and reasoning systems

    • The research program aims at bridging cognitive architecture and large language models to build single cognitive agent or multi-agent environments to support and understand complex cognitive and agent behavior (including information exchange, intention consolidation, etc.).

  • Developing intelligent agents and designing human-agent interaction to support ideation and creativity

    • The research program aims at understanding, designing, and developing single and multiple AI agents to support creativity-related processes, including writing, design, and ideation.
      • Wu, M., Quan, K., Liu, W., Yao, M., & Chin, J. (2025). Incorporating personality into AI writing companions: Mapping the design space. In Proceedings of the Extended Abstracts of the CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI EA’25), Article 341, 1-9, Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1145/3706599.3720185

  • Designing and developing pedagogical agents to support self-regulated learning

    • The research program aims at translating theories in learning sciences, metacognition, and information foraging theory to develop intelligent agents and systems to support self-regulated learning in games and multi-text environments.

Past Projects

  • Designing human-agent interaction to support health information learning of older adults

    • The research program bridged theories in metacognition, self-regulated learning, and storytelling to design and examine conversational agents (CAs) to facilitate obtaining, understanding, and using health information among older adults.
      • Hu, X.*, Desai, S.*, Lundy, M. & Chin, J. (2025). Beyond Functionality: Co-Designing Voice User Interfaces for Older Adults’ Well-being. Proceedings of 7th ACM Conference on Conversational User Interfaces CUI’25. https://doi.org/10.1145/3719160.3736613
      • Desai, S., Chin, J. (2023). OK Google, Let’s Learn: Using Voice User Interfaces for Informal Self-Regulated Learning of Health Topics among Younger and Older Adults. In Proceedings of the 41st ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems CHI’23 (Article 847, pp.1-21). New York, NY: ACM Press. https://doi.org/10.1145/3544548.3581507
      • Desai, S., Hu, X., Lundy, M. & Chin, J. (2023). Using Experience-Based Participatory Approach to Design Interactive Voice User Interfaces for Delivering Physical Activity Programs with Older Adults. Proceedings of the 11th International Conference on Human-Agent Interaction (HAI 2023), Gothenburg, Sweden. https://doi.org/10.1145/3623809.3623827
      • Lundy, M., Desai, S., Chin, J. (2023). Bridging the gap between designers and users: codesigning health-related voice user interface experiences with older adults. Proceedings of the ALISE (Association for Library and Information Science Education) Annual Conference 2023, Milwaukee, WI. https://doi.org/10.21900/j.alise.2023.1377
      • Desai, S., Lundy, M., Chin, J. (2023). “A painless way to learn:” Designing an interactive storytelling voice user interface to support older adults’ informal health information learning needs. Proceedings of the 5th ACM Conference on Conversational User Interfaces CUI’23, Eindhoven, Netherlands. https://doi.org/10.1145/3571884.3597141

  • Designing human-agent interaction to support socioemotional processes of older adults

    • Following Computers as Social Actors, we conducted a series of behavioral experiments to examine how older adults established trust and perceived sociability of CAs through anthropomorphism
      • Chin, J.*, Desai, S*., Lin, S., & Mejía S. (2024). Like My Aunt Dorothy: Effects of Conversational Styles on Perceptions, Acceptance and Metaphorical Descriptions of Voice Assistants during Later Adulthood. Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction, 8(CSCW1), 1-21. https://doi.org/10.1145/3637365.
      • Chin, J.* & Desai, S.* (2021). Being a Nice Partner: The Effects of Age and Interaction Types on the Perceived Social Abilities of Conversational Agents. TMS (American Psychological Association’s Conference on Technology, Mind, & Society) Proceedings 2021. https://doi.org/10.1037/tms0000027

Ongoing and Completed Funding

  • National Science Foundation
  • Napoleon

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