This research paper introduces a new framework called Desire-Driven Autonomy (D2A) for creating AI agents that act more like humans by focusing on intrinsic desires, similar to how people are motivated by things like hunger, social connection, and personal fulfillment. The researchers built a simulator where agents like "Alice" live in a virtual house with different rooms and objects. Alice has a profile that defines her personality traits and how important different desires are to her. Throughout the simulation, Alice's desires fluctuate, and she has to choose actions that will satisfy them, like eating when hungry or calling a friend when lonely. The researchers compared D2A to other AI approaches and found that D2A agents are much better at choosing actions that make them happy and that their actions look more natural and realistic to human observers. This new framework could be used to make more believable and engaging virtual assistants, game characters, and other types of AI agents in the future.

https://arxiv.org/pdf/2412.06435