Leon Reicherts

Research
The goal of my research is to build tools that augment and "tie into" people's thinking through conversational interactions. I am particularly interested in achieving this by scaffolding people's thought-processes through conversational prompts that are tailored to the type of task and that get the user to "stop and think" at appropriate points [see also CUI 2021 paper]. For example, prompts that get the person to reflect on their decision-making performance for a specific task and to get them to (re-)evaluate and adjust their strategies [CUI 2022 paper]; or prompts that get a user to explore a dataset from different perspectives [TOCHI 2022 paper]. Recently, I have also investigated how such prompting can support people's reflection processes to foster well-being [CHI 2023 paper].
All these prototypes I have designed - most of them together with great collaborators - include some form of conversational user interface (CUI), since I believe the lend themselves particularly well to such "cognitive scaffolding". My general aim is to design these interfaces in a way that they tie into the "inner dialogues" we engage in when analysing or reflecting on something, or when making decisions.
Currently I am exploring (1) how some of these CUIs can be designed to tie into and support people's thought-processes over time (using longitudinal study designs), (2) how they can act as a moderator in a collaborative reflection tasks, as well as and (3) how (on a more general level) large language models can be leveraged for the aforementioned "cognitive tasks" that I am focusing on.
My PhD is funded by the Leverhulme Trust as part of the Ecological Brain Doctoral Training Programme.
My supervisors are Yvonne Rogers and Sam Gilbert. Mirco Musolesi is on my thesis committee.
Brief biography
I completed my bachelor's degree in Information Systems at the University of Fribourg in 2016 and my master's degree in Human-Computer Interaction at UCL in 2018. I subsequently worked with Yvonne Rogers, Licia Capra and Neil Sebire on the VoiceViz project, which was a collaboration between UCLIC and the DRIVE unit at Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH).
Research Publications
Authors
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Year
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V Avanesi, J Rockstroh, T Mildner, N Zargham, Leon Reicherts, MA Friehs, D Kontogiorgos, N Wenig, R Malaka | From C-3PO to HAL: Opening the Discourse about the Dark Side of Multi-Modal Social Agents | 2023 | Conference paper (text) |
N Zargham, V Avanesi, Leon Reicherts, Ava Scott, Yvonne Rogers, R Malaka | “Funny How?” A Serious Look at Humor in Conversational Agents | 2023 | Conference paper (text) |
N Wagener, Leon Reicherts, N Zargham, N Bartłomiejczyk, Ava Scott, K Wang, M Bentvelzen, E Stefanidi, T Mildner, Yvonne Rogers | SelVReflect: A Guided VR Experience Fostering Reflection on Personal Challenges | 2023 | Conference paper (text) |
Leon Reicherts, GW Park, Yvonne Rogers | Extending Chatbots to Probe Users: Enhancing Complex Decision-Making Through Probing Conversations | 2022 | Conference paper (text) |
Leon Reicherts, Yvonne Rogers, L Capra, E Wood, Tu Dinh Duong, N Sebire | It's Good to Talk: A Comparison of Using Voice Versus Screen-Based Interactions for Agent-Assisted Tasks | 2022 | ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, Journal article |
N Zargham, Leon Reicherts, M Bonfert, ST Voelkel, J Schoening, R Malaka, Yvonne Rogers | Understanding Circumstances for Desirable Proactive Behaviour of Voice Assistants: The Proactivity Dilemma | 2022 | Conference paper (text) |
Leon Reicherts, N Zargham, M Bonfert, Yvonne Rogers, R Malaka | May I Interrupt? Diverging Opinions on Proactive Smart Speakers | 2021 | Conference paper (text), New York, NY, USA |
Leon Reicherts, Yvonne Rogers | Do Make me Think!: How CUIs Can Support Cognitive Processes | 2020 | Conference paper (text) |
T Bouwman, Leon Reicherts | Manypulo: A Flexible System Facilitating the Creation of Interactive Physical Prototypes | 2020 | Conference paper (text) |