Conversation Summarization System Emphasizing Recent Context for Supporting Seamless Rejoining of a Group Chat After Temporary Absence

This study focuses on a specific issue that emerges when a member temporarily leaves a group face-to-face chat. In such a situation, the leaving member often struggles to understand the conversation context when they return to the conversation. We propose a system that presents a summary of the conversation content after the user has left to facilitate a smooth rejoining of the chat in such a situation. In our system, an original summarization method, recent conversation summarization, which focuses on the conversation content just before rejoining, is incorporated to provide a suitable summary for rejoining the conversation. We conducted experiments to assess the proposed concept and its summarization method. From the results in the preliminary experiment for testing the effectiveness of the recent conversation summarization in controlled conversation settings, it is found that users were able to understand conversation content easily and rejoin conversations early in the case of using recent conversation summarization. From the results in the main experiment for evaluating the support of the system in a real conversational context, it is suggested that the proposed method can support understanding of the conversation context and early rejoining.