Data_Sheet_4_SlimMe, a Chatbot With Artificial Empathy for Personal Weight Management: System Design and Finding.pdf

As the obesity rate continues to increase persistently, there is an urgent need to develop an effective weight loss management strategy. Nowadays, the development of artificial intelligence (AI) and cognitive technologies coupled with the rapid spread of messaging platforms and mobile technology with easier access to internet technology offers professional dietitians an opportunity to provide extensive monitoring support to their clients through a chatbot with artificial empathy. This study aimed to design a chatbot with artificial empathic motivational support for weight loss called “SlimMe” and investigate how people react to a diet bot. The SlimMe infrastructure was built using Dialogflow as the natural language processing (NLP) platform and LINE mobile messenger as the messaging platform. We proposed a text-based emotion analysis to simulate artificial empathy responses to recognize the user's emotion. A preliminary evaluation was performed to investigate the early-stage user experience after a 7-day simulation trial. The result revealed that having an artificially empathic diet bot for weight loss management is a fun and exciting experience. The use of emoticons, stickers, and GIF images makes the chatbot response more interactive. Moreover, the motivational support and persuasive messaging features enable the bot to express more empathic and engaging responses to the user. In total, there were 1,007 bot responses from 892 user input messages. Of these, 67.38% (601/1,007) of the chatbot-generated responses were accurate to a relevant user request, 21.19% (189/1,007) inaccurate responses to a relevant request, and 10.31% (92/1,007) accurate responses to an irrelevant request. Only 1.12% (10/1,007) of the chatbot does not answer. We present the design of an artificially empathic diet bot as a friendly assistant to help users estimate their calorie intake and calories burned in a more interactive and engaging way. To our knowledge, this is the first chatbot designed with artificial empathy features, and it looks very promising in promoting long-term weight management. More user interactions and further data training and validation enhancement will improve the bot's in-built knowledge base and emotional intelligence base.

随着肥胖率持续攀升，开发高效的体重管理策略已刻不容缓。如今，人工智能（AI）与认知技术的蓬勃发展，加之即时通讯平台、移动技术的快速普及，以及互联网接入门槛的持续降低，为专业营养师带来了全新契机：他们可通过搭载人工共情能力的聊天机器人（chatbot），为服务对象提供全方位的监测支持。本研究旨在设计一款名为“SlimMe”的、具备人工共情式激励支持功能的减肥类聊天机器人，并探究用户对该饮食聊天机器人的使用反馈。SlimMe的技术架构以Dialogflow作为自然语言处理（NLP）平台，并依托LINE移动通讯应用作为消息交互载体。本研究提出了基于文本的情感分析方案，用以模拟人工共情式回复，实现对用户情绪的识别。研究开展了初步评估，在为期7天的模拟试用后，对早期用户体验进行了调研。结果表明，搭载人工共情功能的减肥饮食聊天机器人，可为用户带来兼具趣味性与沉浸感的使用体验。表情符号、贴纸与动态图像（GIF）的合理运用，使得聊天机器人的回复更具交互性。此外，激励性支持与劝导式消息功能，可让机器人向用户传递更具共情力与参与感的回复内容。本次研究共收集到892条用户输入消息，共计生成1007条机器人回复。其中，67.38%（601/1007）的机器人回复精准匹配用户相关请求，21.19%（189/1007）的回复未匹配相关请求，10.31%（92/1007）的回复匹配了无关请求，仅1.12%（10/1007）的机器人未能作出有效应答。本研究展示了一款具备人工共情功能的饮食聊天机器人的设计方案，该机器人可作为友好助手，以更具交互性与参与感的方式，帮助用户估算热量摄入与消耗情况。据我们所知，这是首款搭载人工共情特性的聊天机器人，其在推动长期体重管理方面展现出了可观的应用前景。未来通过拓展更多用户交互场景、进一步优化数据训练与验证流程，可完善机器人内置的知识库与情感智能库。