{"title":"Similarity attracts, or does it? Studying personality-based convergence and sense of engagement with a digital health assistant","authors":"Anna Spagnolli , Enrico D’Agostini , Mariavittoria Masotina , Giulia Cenzato , Luciano Gamberini","doi":"10.1016/j.tele.2025.102262","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>According to the similarity-attraction hypothesis in social psychology, users prefer people like them (or “convergent” with them) in attitudes and behaviors. In this study, we test the similarity-attraction hypothesis on conversational agents (CAs) by measuring if they are more engaging when their perceived personality converges with the users’. We simulated on the Qualtrics platform a textual Digital Health Assistant (DHA) whose style could vary thanks to incorporating specific linguistic cues. The study participants interacted with the DHA variants, assessed their personality, and then rated their engagement. They also assessed their own personality. After correlating engagement and personality scores for each DHA variant, we found no effect of convergence. These results contribute to a better understanding of CA personalization, questioning similarity as a widespread strategy whose high privacy toll might not be compensated by improving the user experience.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48257,"journal":{"name":"Telematics and Informatics","volume":"98 ","pages":"Article 102262"},"PeriodicalIF":7.6000,"publicationDate":"2025-03-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Telematics and Informatics","FirstCategoryId":"91","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0736585325000243","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"INFORMATION SCIENCE & LIBRARY SCIENCE","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
According to the similarity-attraction hypothesis in social psychology, users prefer people like them (or “convergent” with them) in attitudes and behaviors. In this study, we test the similarity-attraction hypothesis on conversational agents (CAs) by measuring if they are more engaging when their perceived personality converges with the users’. We simulated on the Qualtrics platform a textual Digital Health Assistant (DHA) whose style could vary thanks to incorporating specific linguistic cues. The study participants interacted with the DHA variants, assessed their personality, and then rated their engagement. They also assessed their own personality. After correlating engagement and personality scores for each DHA variant, we found no effect of convergence. These results contribute to a better understanding of CA personalization, questioning similarity as a widespread strategy whose high privacy toll might not be compensated by improving the user experience.
期刊介绍:
Telematics and Informatics is an interdisciplinary journal that publishes cutting-edge theoretical and methodological research exploring the social, economic, geographic, political, and cultural impacts of digital technologies. It covers various application areas, such as smart cities, sensors, information fusion, digital society, IoT, cyber-physical technologies, privacy, knowledge management, distributed work, emergency response, mobile communications, health informatics, social media's psychosocial effects, ICT for sustainable development, blockchain, e-commerce, and e-government.