TaleMate
TaleMate, is an interactive joint reading app that enhances the joint reading experience of reading e-books.
Overview
TaleMate, is an interactive joint reading app that allows parents and children to assign different character roles while taking turns reading an e-book with voice agents. We found that the system supported children's engagement and story comprehension.
Contributions
This project served as my thesis for my MS degree in Computer Science at Virginia Tech, and I began working on it in 2022.
I conceptualized and designed TaleMate to assess the joint reading experience between parents and children when a voice agent (VA) is incorporated. As a part of my research, I also crafted the experiment and conducted a user study involving 11 pairs of parents and children.
To understand the perceptions of parents and children about the system, I undertook a qualitative analysis, focusing on the inclusion of a voice agent in the reading process. Additionally, a quantitative analysis was performed to evaluate children’s engagement and reading comprehension.
Results
Preliminary results suggest that children were engaged and enjoyed reading with TaleMate alongside their parents.
Furthermore, while some parents found the interaction of taking turns with voice agents slightly "awkward", they still recognized the potential benefits of this collaborative approach.
This work was submitted to the CHI 2023 Conference, and we also showcased the design through a poster presentation at UIST 2023.