Quid pro quo? Reciprocal self-disclosure and communicative accomodation towards a virtual interviewer

Abstract

Cassell and Miller [1] proposed the use of virtual agents as interviewers to be advantageous, because one can control for interviewer effects and variance, provide a sense of anonymity and increase the interviewee's motivation to complete the survey. Against the background of Communication Adaptation Theory and empirical results on reciprocal self-disclosure, we investigated the influence of the agent's reciprocal self-disclosure and wordiness on participants' self-disclosure and perception of the agent and the interview in an experimental study with a 2x2 between-subjects design. While reciprocal self-disclosure only affected perceived co-presence, wordiness influenced both the participants' verbal behavior (with regard to word usage and intimacy of answers) and their perception of the interview. Theoretical implications are discussed. © 2011 Springer-Verlag.