A modular architecture for adaptive ChatBots

We illustrate an architecture for a conversational agent based on a modular knowledge representation. This solution provides intelligent conversational agents with a dynamic and flexible behavior. The modularity of the architecture allows a concurrent and synergic use of different techniques, making it possible to use the most adequate methodology for the management of a specific characteristic of the domain, of the dialogue, or of the user behavior. We show the implementation of a proof-of-concept prototype: a set of modules exploiting different knowledge representation techniques and capable to differently manage conversation features has been developed. Each module is automatically triggered through a component, named corpus callosum, whose task is to choose, time by time, the most adequate chatbot knowledge section to activate. © 2011 IEEE.