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An Introduction to TuTalk: Developing Dialogue Agents for Learning Studies

Pamela Jordan

University of Pittsburgh

Learning Research and Development Center

What is TuTalk?

Dialogue system construction tool for learning applicationsAuthoring tools for setting up an artificial

dialogue partner/agentDialogue agent that conducts:

Agent-led or mixed-initiative dialogues and Tutorial or conversational dialogues

TuTalk Team

Authoring tools: Carolyn Rosé Yue Cui (Jenny) Jaime Arguello Emil Albright Rohit Kumar

Dialogue agents: Pam Jordan Brian Hall (Moses) Mike Ringenberg

TuTalk History

Andes-Atlas: 3 physics experiment (Rosé) Why2-Atlas: 3 physics experiments (VanLehn,

Jordan, Rosé) ITSpoke: 2 physics experiment (Litman) ProPL: 1 computer science experiment (Lane) 2 Reflective Followup experiments in Physics

(Katz) 2 Thermodynamics experiment (Rosé)

All found significant learning gains for students using 3 prior versions of TuTalk

ProPL

Dialogue in Learning Applications

Short answer tutorial dialogue Circsim-Tutor:

In use in medical school classrooms More effective than problem solving alone

AutoTutor: Computer literacy Some mixed-initiative More effective than reading a textbook

Peer collaborations Language practice

Circsim-Tutor

TuTalk Design Goals

Authoring for non-programmers Supporting rapid customization &

improvement of dialogue agent Plug & play architecture for easier addition of

new or improved features Configuration options that alter global

dialogue behavior (e.g. re-ask after digression or not)

Core modules: capabilities and limitations

Understanding: Short answer questions only Generation: stored phrases Student Model: uses dialogue history to assess

student performance Dialogue Manager: limited mixed initiative

handling, automated feedback/transitions All can be replaced (e.g. LSA for understanding

longer responses)

Finite state dialogue management

As a runner pushes a ball away, what horizontal forces act on it?

{runner’s}{gravitational, *}

<subdialog > <subdialog>Good!

After the push ends, what forces….?

<anything else>

Example dialogue

T: Let’s consider the forces acting on objects after they have been thrown. As a runner pushes a ball away, what horizontal forces are acting on it while she is pushing it?

S: Gravity?T: In what direction does gravity act?S: downwardT: Yes. So is a downward force a horizontal or vertical

force?S: It is verticalT: Right. I asked for the horizontal forces instead and the

only one is from the runner. After the push ends, what horizontal forces are acting

on the ball?

Subdialogue

Authoring basics

Write recipes and concepts Concepts are like the ingredient list in a cooking

recipe Recipe uses a simple referring expression (concept

label) and must look at ingredient list for the details

Recipe has one to many steps Step is an

Initiation that is optionally paired with an expected Response

Can be a pointer to another recipe

Examples of concept specifications (abstract)

ask_share_appetizer [So, should we share an appetizer?] [I’d like to share an appetizer. What looks good

to you?]

skip_appetizer [I don’t want an appetizer] [Let’s skip the appetizer]

Example of a dialogue script (abstract)

Response action: push to recipe named

possible responses

Recipe: select-appetizer

Step: enthuse_about_appetizers

Step: ask_share_appetizer

[agree_to_share_appetizer]

[skip_appetizer abort, ask-soup]

[unknown abort, loose-temper]

Step: agree-on-appetizer

initiation

Concept to realize or recognize

Subrecipe: push to recipe named

goal name

Tuesday TuTalk Offerings

See http://andes3.lrdc.pitt.edu/TuTalk/corpora/ Create a simple TuTalk Dialogue Agent The Methodology and Basics of Authoring TuTalk Dialogue Agents:

Dialogue authoring methodologies Drawing inspiration from a corpus Incremental development of

dialogues.  Advice/findings on effective learning dialogues Review and expand on basic features of TuTalk

Advanced TuTalk Dialogue Agents Explore additional dialogue features of TuTalk (e.g. controlling

automatic response feedback) How to incorporate language understanding capabilities of TagHelper

Click to edit the title text formatDemo & Hands-On

Extend Existing Script: add new step (1)

See ProPl dialogue handout Open script file; a collection of recipes

(top-menu:author:new script file) Open template for a recipe (top-

menu:author:new template)Can have same goal name multiple timesTemplate name distinguishes between them

Extend Existing Script: add new step (2)

Create new step at end (top-menu:author:insert pair)

Create new step initiation (right click to right of initiation display box:enter phrase for initiation concept: enter concept label)

Create new step response (right click to right of response display box: enter phrase for response concept: enter concept label)

Extend Existing Script: add response action (1)

Save template (top menu: save template) Create a new response template with one step

(top menu: new template) Save new template (top menu: save template) Open template (top menu: open template) Attach new template to a response (right click to

right of response: pick goal)

Extend Existing Script: add response action (2)

Right click to right of response: pick goal Right click to right of response: display

goal If recipe is one wanted – select okay If recipe is not one wanted – select cancel: re-

pick goal with left click