Combining Two Decision Making Theories for Affective Learning in Programming Courses

Recently it has been widely acknowledged that the recognition of emotions of computer users can provide more user friendly systems and eventually increase the productivity of users. User friendly interfaces are even more important for the design of educational software that is appropriate for young children. In human-human interaction the expression of emotions of people can be evident in different modes of interaction, such as in speech, in body language, and in facial expressions. In human-computer interaction evidence about the users’ emotional states can be drawn by the input devices each user uses for his/her interaction with a computer. In this paper we describe how two decision making theories have been combined in order to provide emotional interaction in an educational application. The resulting educational system is targeted to young children that are taught the basic principles of programming through our own implementation of a programming language called AffectLOGO.