Empathic Computer Science: A Systematic Mapping

Described as the capability to understand the emotional state of an individual and often express a response that resonates with it, empathy is a crucial factor for social interactions. However, the ability to express empathy diminishes as people rely more and more on technological resources to interact. Due to fact of being an essential component to become a more effective social relationship between humans and computers, there are several approaches, techniques, methods or mechanisms to promote empathy in these interactions. This paper proposes to identify and systematize mechanisms used in Computer Science to promote empathy. Thus, it was carried out a systematic mapping on the main research databases of the area. We identified the main approaches used to promote empathy, such as Empathic Robotic Agent/Device and Empathic Virtual Agent, as well as the countries that hold the most research in this line, especially the United Kingdom, Japan and USA. In addition, it was found that this area of research is still not being explored in any significant way.