Hug, TheoFriesen, Norm2023-08-212023-08-212008https://mediarep.org/handle/doc/20997As an alternative to dominant cognitive-constructivist approaches to educational technology, this paper utilizes what has been termed a “discursive,” or “post-cognitive” psychological research paradigm. It does so by adapting discursive and conversational analyses to the study of educational technology use. It applies these adapted techniques specifically to discursive interactions with “chat bots” or “intelligent agents,” and to the theories commonly associated with them. In doing so, it presents a critique of notions of human-computer “indistinguishability” or “equality” as they have been articulated from Alan Turing (1950) to Reeves and Nass (1996), and it sketches an alternative account of the potential and limitations of this technology. In divergence from Turing and Reeves and Nass, human discourse generated through encounters with these “natural language interfaces” is seen as emphasizing the issue of “conversation” itself, foregrounding the achievement of common discursive aims and projects, rather than illuminating the internal states of either interlocutor.engIn Copyrighteducational technologychat bots30000010.25969/mediarep/19785978-3-902571-67-0