Judy Shackelford, who has been in the toy industry for more than 40 years, has seen a lot of dolls. But none, she says, like her latest creation, a marvel of digital technologies, including speech-recognition and memory chips, radio frequency tags and scanners, and facial robotics. She and her team have christened it Amazing Amanda.

“The toy industry is sort of like ‘MacGyver,’ ” Ms. Shackelford said, invoking the problem-solving 1980’s television hero. “You’re always doing workarounds, figuring out how to rearrange the old in some new way to create something new. And you’ve got to do it for nickels and dimes and quarters.”



She then turned to the doll seated on her lap. “Hi, honey,” Ms. Shackelford said gently to Amazing Amanda, a blond, blue-eyed figure bearing more than a remote likeness to its creator.



“Hello, my name is Amanda,” the doll replied as Ms. Shackelford smiled warmly at its rosy face. “We’re going to have the best time together,” the doll promised.



Amazing Amanda, scheduled for release next month by Playmates Toys, is expected to cost $99, said Ms. Shackelford, the chief executive of J. Shackelford & Associates, a product and marketing company in Moorpark, Calif., that specializes in toys and children’s entertainment.



At that price, the same as Apple’s entry-level iPod Shuffle digital music player, the 18-inch-tall doll promises - right on the box it will be sold in - to “listen, speak and show emotion.” Some analysts and buyers who have seen Amanda say it represents an evolutionary leap from earlier talking dolls like Chatty Cathy of the 1960’s, a doll that cycled through a collection of recorded phrases when a child pulled a cord in its back.



Radio frequency tags in Amanda’s accessories - including toy food, potty and clothing - wirelessly inform the doll of what it is interacting with. For instance, if the doll asks for a spoon of peas and it is given its plastic cookie, it will gently admonish its caregiver, telling her that a cookie is not peas.



While $99 is a premium price for a doll, it is only about $10 more than the price of the popular American Girl dolls. And, Ms. Shackelford said, Amanda may prove that girls as well as boys can embrace technology in their toys.



While video games and interactive robots, like Wow Wee’s Robosapien, have long been successful in capturing the imaginations and buying power of preteenage and adolescent boys, a different assumption has been made about what girls want, analysts say.



Part of the popularity of low-tech dolls like Mattel’s Chatty Cathy and Barbie, and more recent additions like Bratz (from MGA Entertainment) and the American Girl dolls (a line acquired by Mattel), has been that they allowed young girls to use their imagination, said David Riley, a senior manager at the NPD Group, a market research firm.



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