Research

We reside in an era characterized by rapid technological transformation. Concepts that were once the purview of science fiction, such as smart homes, self-driving cars, the Internet of Things, and intelligent personal assistants, have become our reality. It’s predicted that in the coming decades, (semi-)intelligent digital agents based on artificial intelligence will become commonplace in our daily lives.

To maintain our agency and informed decision-making capabilities in this shifting landscape, it’s imperative that we anticipate and address potential impacts as early as possible. With this in mind, I view future-oriented research as a critical endeavor. It’s a challenge I enthusiastically embrace, aiming to contribute to a well-informed society ready to navigate the implications of these advancements.

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Projects

Post-Doctoral Project started 2023

Operating under the working title, „The Ontological Definition in Human-Machine Communication – Disentangling Heuristic and Reflective Definitions, Media Equation and Media Evocation,“ this project seeks to construct a theoretical and methodological framework, which hopefully enables us to differentiate among various processes during the situational definition, their interactions, and their evolution over time and provides a more nuanced understanding of human-machine communication.

Doctoral Thesis 2017–2022
”Perception of Voice-Based Agents as Social Actors” at TU Dresden.
The project’s key questions were: Are voice-based assistants perceived as social actors? If so, what characteristics do they and the interaction with them possess, and which contexts are influencing this perception?

Defended: 14.12.2022

Puplications from the Thesis:

• Etzrodt, K., & Engesser, S. (2019). Ubiquitous tools, connected things and intelligent agents: Disentangling the terminology and revealing underlying theoretical dimensions. First Monday, 24(9). https://doi.org/10.5210/fm.v24i9.9700
• Etzrodt, K. (2021). The ontological classification of conversational agents. An adaptation of Piaget’s equilibration theory. In A. Følstad A. et al. (Eds.), Chatbot Research and Design. CONVERSATIONS 2020. Lecture Notes in Computer Science (Vol. 12604, pp. 48–63). Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-68288-0_4
• Etzrodt, K. & Engesser, S. (2021). Voice-based agents as personified things: Assimilation and accommodation as equilibration of doubt. Human-Machine Communication, 2, 57–79. https://doi.org/10.30658/hmc.2.3
• Etzrodt, K. (2022). The third party will make a difference—A study on the impact of dyadic and triadic social situations on the relationship with a voice-based personal agent. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhcs.2022.102901

SAMT 2021
”Gutachten zur Medienvielfalt und Transparenz bei Sprachassistenten” (Expertise on media diversity and transparency in voice-based assistants, together with Lisa Weidmüller and Sven Engesser)

Summer School 2019
”Voice Interaction and Voice Assistants in Health Care” (together with an interdisciplinary and international Team at TU Dresden)

Smart Home Lab since 2017
Assistance, research and management of the Smart Home Lab at the Institute of Media and Communication, TU Dresden headed by Sven Engesser.