Modalities, Styles and Strategies: An Interaction Framework for Human–Computer Co-Creativity

Human-computer co-creativity research is relatively new, and comparing how co-creative systems augment creativity is challenging even within the same creative domain. This paper proposes a framework to facilitate such comparisons, drawing on domain-agnostic concepts in interaction design research. It describes the different aspects of the interactions between one or more humans and their computationally creative collaborators at three levels: interaction modalities, interaction styles, and interaction strategies. Modalities are the channels by which information is exchanged, styles are the different behaviours and models that govern the system’s actions over those channels, and strategies are the goals and plans that shape those behaviours. The paper ends with an analysis of nine co-creative systems, demonstrating how the framework makes the comparison of very different systems possible.