An Experimental Study Exploring Human–AI Complementarity in Early Social-Emotional Learning

Synthesis: Raave, Colasante, Roldan Roa, Ramos Martinez, Li, and colleagues (2026) run a controlled comparison of a Generative AI pedagogical conversational agent (PCA) and human educators independently facilitating story-based social-emotional learning activities with a static AI child, using 18 simulations per facilitator across three activities (108 observations) rated by expert coders blind to facilitator type. The PCA showed strengths in basic relational and instructional domains — maintaining a respectful tone and routinely providing procedural Scaffolding — while educators showed strengths in deeper SEL instruction, guiding reflection and promoting social-emotional knowledge.

Key Findings

• Expert raters blind to facilitator type found significant differences between the PCA and human educators on dialogue indicators.
• The PCA excelled at basic relational and instructional domains: maintaining a respectful tone and providing routine procedural scaffolding.
• Human educators excelled at deeper SEL instruction: guiding reflection and promoting social-emotional knowledge.
• Findings support a human–AI complementarity framing rather than treating PCAs as direct substitutes for educators in SEL.

Implications for AI in Education

The study is among the first to experimentally assess PCAs versus human educators in social-emotional learning, using a static AI child to isolate facilitator effects. It suggests generative-AI pedagogical agents can reliably handle foundational relational and procedural scaffolding, freeing human educators to concentrate on the deeper reflective and relational work of SEL. This advances the human–AI complementarity agenda and informs design of pedagogical conversational agents for Social-Emotional Learning and early childhood education.

Connected Concepts

• Social-Emotional Learning
• Pedagogical Agent
• Human AI Collaboration
• Early Childhood Education
• Affective Computing

Connected Articles

• [social-robot-study-companions] — social robots as study companions
• [knowledge-based-design-generative-social-robots-2026] — knowledge-based design of generative social robots

Citation

Raave, D. K., Colasante, T., Roldan Roa, E., Ramos Martinez, J. C., Li, H., et al. (2026). An experimental study exploring human–AI complementarity in early social-emotional learning. Computers and Education Open, 10, 100331.