I’ve got a Chihuahua who weighs 14 pounds. Kept feeding him. That and he’s probably not 100% Chihuahua. At first, he was known as Snuggle-Bunny because he loved us so much – always wanted to be close by. After a while, he was known as Sweet-Pickle because he was such a sweetheart – never barked or cried. One day by accident, I called him Snuggle-Pickle. The nickname stuck.

I like to assign human characteristics to my 14 pound boy. I’m a dog mom. I can’t help myself. Fortunately, I’m not alone. Most people assign human characteristics to their pets – as well as other more inanimate things. We’re hardwired to do this. It’s a built in heuristic (mental shortcut) that makes human to human social interactions easier. Without heuristics like these, we would have to exert a lot more brain power to deal with simple situations. But these social predispositions are so ingrained in us that it’s hard not to apply them when we interact with other, nonhuman things. Technology is no exception.

Take a look at MIT’s Kismet. She’s an anthropomorphic talking head. But to most people who meet her, she’s a 2 year old child. People adore Kismet. When they interact with her, they speak motherease. When they hurt her feelings, they feel bad and try to make it up to her (see several videos of Kismet). Some groups are against the production of ‘intelligent’ robots like Kismet. They think that creation of such technologies goes against nature and raises questions that are too difficult to answer. But they’ll never lay a hand on Kismet. Oh no. After all, she’s only 2.

Have a chat with A.L.I.C.E. She’s a massive database of questions and answers. But to most people who meet her, she’s one of the best web-based conversational agents in the world. During the last major election, I asked A.L.I.C.E. whether she was a Democrat or Republican. She told me she was a Libertarian. When you get to talking with A.L.I.C.E, it’s easy to forget that she’s not a real person. It’s easy to forget that she’s talking to several hundred other people while she’s talking to you.

A group of researchers recently discovered that users are most likely to disclose personal information to computers ‘who’ disclose ‘personal information’ to them. For example, computers ‘who’ say things like…

I only have 28k modem speed but I wish I had more, what are your shortcomings?

…are more likely to elicit personal information from users than computers ‘who’ say…

What are your shortcomings?

I often question whether findings like these could be used to influence conversion behavior. If we disclose more information about ourselves before users convert, for example, will users be more willing to give us personal information during conversion? I imagine they might. And the truth is, there are so many findings like these – just waiting for people like us to apply them to what we do. The possibilities seem endless in the veritable gold mine of human-computer social interaction research (see The Media Equation or anything by Byron Reeves and Clifford Nass for findings). Those who leverage this research will likely spawn some of the most powerful conversion strategies that this industry has ever known.