Emotional Incongruency in Pedagogical Agents: The Superior Impact of Positive Tone Over Positive Visuals

• In Event: Rethinking Learner Engagement in the Age of Intelligent Systems

Abstract

In real classrooms, teachers’ emotional tone and visual expressions sometimes mismatch, yet the impact on learning remains unclear. This study examined how (in)congruency between a human-like pedagogical agent’s vocal tone and facial/gestural expressions affects simulation-based learning. Results revealed that positive visual-tone congruency significantly improved retention, positive emotion, and intrinsic motivation compared to positive visual-dominant and outperformed the neutral congruency condition in all measures. Surprisingly, the positive tone-dominant incongruency produced comparable effects to positive congruency across all outcomes and surpassed visual-dominant incongruency in retention and positive emotions. Mediation analysis further confirmed that tone-induced positive emotions contributed to improved retention and motivation.

Authors

• Shufan Yu, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University

• Qingtang Liu, Central China Normal University

• Ruiqiu Ye, Central China Normal University

• Suxiao Xu, University of Hong Kong

• Ping Li, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University