AMANDA: An ITS for Mediating Asynchronous Group Discussions

Abstract

This paper describes AMANDA, an intelligent system designed to mediate asynchronous group discussions in distance learning environments. The objective of AMANDA is to help on-line tutors achieve better results from group discussions by fostering interaction among distance learners. The overall idea is to organize group discussions in argumentation trees and involve the participants in successive discussion rounds through intelligent mediation. The mediation of the discussion is entirely computational, i.e. no human mediating intervention is required. Mediation is accomplished by a set of mediation algorithms that reason over the argumentation tree and propose new interactions among the participants. Field experiments have shown that AMANDA improves interaction in distance learning situations and can be particularly useful for supporting online tutors in conducting group discussions. © Springer-Verlag 2004.