The problem of child abuse is very difficult to handle, because it is one of the best kept secrets that exist. Studying drawings is one of the most widespread methods that investigate child abuse, because one can draw sensitive information without producing fear or anxiety to the child. The present study investigated the frequency of appearance of 20emotional indicators in the drawings produced by abused and non abused children. The subjects of the study were 101 abused and 72 non abused elementary school children. The researcher asked the children to draw a human figure, and these drawings were scored for the presence or absence of 20 emotional indicators which reflect the negative feelings of the drawer (Koppitz, 1968. Malchiodi, 1997). Twelve of thosetwenty emotional indicators appeared significantly more often in the drawings produced by the abused children (p<0,000 to p<0,003). The results of this study show that drawings when analyzed by adequatelytrained specialists, and when combined with other diagnostic methods, can be used to uncover child abuse. The danger behind drawing interpretation by nontrained people is emphasized in the present study.

This study focuses on the design and implementation of three narrative pedagogical agents, which act as descending guidance assistants for adolescent student-users of the Geo-Histor multimedia learning environment. The goal of creating and using pedagogical agents was to empower students to use strategies before, during, and after reading. The pedagogical agents that emerged from the bibliographic inquiry and students' choices were anthropomorphic, cheerful and attractive animations, with real human voice, discussing with humor and representing real-life peer grouping. Agents provide declining guidance to students through dialogues implementing reading strategies included as statements on the Metacognitive Awareness of Reading Strategies Inventory (Marsi 1.0). Each agent builds his character, and thus his speech, based on the fact that he represents another kind of knowledge, declarative, procedural and conditional. In the following study, comparisons were made between two groups of students who used or did not use narrative pedagogical agents for their studying. The findings show that when students use agents, they make significant progress in using reading strategies. Finally, a comparison between boys and girls showed that the reported use of strategies is greater among girls than boys.