Intelligent virtual agents (IVAs) are interactive characters that exhibit human-like qualities and communicate with humans or with each other using natural human modalities such as speech and gesture. They are capable of real-time perception, cognition and action that allows them to participate in a dynamic social environment.

IVA-09 is an interdisciplinary annual conference and the main forum for presenting research on modeling, developing and evaluating intelligent virtual agents with a focus on commu-nicative abilities and social behavior. In addition to pre-sentations on theoretical issues, the conference encourages the showcasing of working applications. Researchers from the fields of human-human and human-robot interaction are also welcome to share work which has a bearing on intelligent virtual agents.

Co-location with ACII-09

IVA-09 will be co-located in Amsterdam with the complemen tary Affective Computing & Intelligent Interaction International Conference (ACII-09), held 10-12 Sep 09. While this is a great opportunity to make the most of a trip to Amsterdam, the same paper should not be submitted to both conferences: papers with a primary focus on intelligent virtual agents are encouraged to be submitted to IVA, papers with a focus on emotion are encouraged to be submitted to ACII.

Topics

Design and modeling of IVAs

* design criteria and design methodologies
* evaluation methodologies and user studies
* ethical considerations and social impact
* applicable lessons from other fields (e.g. robotics)
* dimensions of intelligence, cognition and behavior
* models of personality and cultural awareness
* models of social competence
* models of multimodal perception and action
* models of emotional communicative behavior

Implementation of IVAs

* software engineering issues
* real-time integrated systems
* portability and reuse
* standards / measures to support interoperability
* specialized tools, toolkits and tool chains
* specialized modeling and animation technologies

Applications of IVAs

* future role and/or current experience in various fields including:
o computer games
o art and entertainment
o education and training
o simulation and visualization
* delivery platforms:
o desktop
o single/multi-user
o virtual/augmented/mixed reality

Conceptual frameworks for IVAs

* learned, evolved or emergent behavior
* improvisational or dramatic interaction
* stages of autonomy (from avatars to agents)
* massive simulations of crowds

Special topic: Games

IVA-09 particularly encourages submissions on this year’s special topic of games. Read more.

Papers and Posters

* Submission of all papers: 17 April 09
* Notification of acceptance: 22 May 09
* Camera-ready copies: 12 June 09
* GALA video submission: 01 June 09
* Conference: 14-16 September 09