Employing Futuristic Autobiographies to envision emerging human-agent interactions: The case of intelligent companions for stress management

Technology-supported stress management is one of the most promising and practically important application areas for intelligent companions, that is, digital assistants evoking empathy and personal attachment. In this paper, we employ the method of Futuristic Autobiographies (FABs) to elicit participants’ attitudes and reflections regarding an imaginary digital assistant for stress management, implemented as an intelligent companion. For the purposes of the study, we developed six FABs, highlighting a range of potential issues related to the use of intelligent companions. The participants (N=17) provided their responses to the FABs by completing a survey, and a subset of the participants (N=5) also took part in follow-up online interviews. A thematic analysis of the results revealed six main themes: objectivity of the digital assistant, human-likeness, context-specificity of assistant's behavior, user's control, stress management, and user privacy. The themes, as well as the implications of the results for the design and use of intelligent stress management companions, are discussed.