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Science

Eye Contact Will Influence Man-Machine Interaction 99

Posted by CowboyNeal from the no-one-talk-to-me-or-look-at-me dept.
atari_kid writes "ScienceDaily is running a story about a researcher findings on the importance of eye contact in group communications. More importantly, the findings show how the amount of eye contact one receives in a group will effect the number of turns one can take in a discussion. What is interesting about the study his how it will effect the design of the future communication devices, like for example: 'Collaborative Virtual Environments (CVEs) which support communication between people and machines.' The research findings will be also used to facilitate user interactions with devices like PDA's and cell phones. I wonder if the findings could explain why the 'beautiful people' have such influence on the mass media."
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Eye Contact Will Influence Man-Machine Interaction More

Eye Contact Will Influence Man-Machine Interaction

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  • Wow (Score:5, Funny)

    by Gary Franczyk ( 7387 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:10AM (#4738370)
    Does this mean Xeyes will actually have a useful function?

    It's the future of computing!

  • So this means that... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by jorleif ( 447241 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:12AM (#4738378)
    So this means that if I wanted to become really dominant in a conversation, I could bribe a couple of the participators to look at me once in a while, and rarely at my "opponent"? Hmmm suddenly I realize that a sales team should never ever consist of under ten people...

  • Somewhat counter-productive (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Egonis Similaris ( 628731 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:12AM (#4738380)
    I am a rehabilitation/social worker for the blind and visually impaired... a great percentage of the world population has eye conditions, in which eye contact is difficult as a result of poor focus, strabismus, to name a few. When communicating with someone who is visually impaired, many other key stimulus must be realized. A blind or visually impaired person may show body language suggesting their desire to speak, or simply wait-out, at which point, people usually listen to the quiet group member. I think that using eye-contact as a variable in online group meetings is an interesting idea, but many other considerations must be met.

  • Other interesting findings... (Score:5, Funny)

    by David Wong ( 199703 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:13AM (#4738384) Homepage
    A University of Chicago study in 1994 found that the quality of a woman's interaction with a group of males can be measured by the amount of eye contact with her breasts.
    • Directly or inversely?

    • Re:Other interesting findings... (Score:1, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Evolution should have put women's eyes on their breasts, so we can make eye contact there.
    • the quality of a woman's interaction with a group of males can be measured by the amount of eye contact with her breasts

      You forgot to mention whether it was proportional or inversely proprtional, what effect the size of the breasts, and whether the other interacters were male or female. This is ambiguous.

      Sorry to be facetious -- you are the messenger. I remember any number of studies reporting that in univeristy classes, men talked far more and were more likely to interrupt, not just each other but more so female students, and also female instructors. This isn't an indictment of anyone, but a statistical fact, and I'm curious what should be done about it. First off, avert your eyes from the breasts of your colleagues.
      • I remember any number of studies reporting that in univeristy classes, men talked far more and were more likely to interrupt, not just each other but more so female students, and also female instructors.

        This is a social safeguard often employed by men of above average intelligence when confronted by breasts. The babbling is a desperate attempt to keep the higher cognitive functions going while the blood is rushing the other way. Even so, we often fail, as witnessed by the occasional glazed eyes and hanging yaw.
        • Actually, I think the intelligence/ogling thing runs in inverse proportion. The smart discreet ones know they have a much better chance of getting a date.

          Anyone see the SNL skit years ago with Kirstie Alley where alien women visit, and they've mutated so that their eyes are in their breasts, where men always looked exclusively anyway? The reporters paid lots of attention, but not to what they had to say. Dumb skit, clever premise.

  • older study on virt teams (Score:4, Interesting)

    by pends ( 259755 ) <arun_penda@rediffm a i l . c om> on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:13AM (#4738385) Homepage

    one study done on virtual teams that spent a long time interacting via the internet, and then brought together for a brief time period to interact spent most of their time just introducing themselves to each other.

    apparently, interaction with each other is more than just talking to one another,(mail qualifies for that, or say video attachments on mails) ..... the eye contact part is not somthing to be trifled with.

  • No kidding... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by gr8_phk ( 621180 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:14AM (#4738392)
    "The amount of eye contact you recieve" reflects the amount of interest other people have in YOU. Obviously if the group is more willing to look at you they'll let you participate more. I wonder how much eye contact these guys get from women.

    Anyone who's read "how to win friends and infulence people" know you score points by paying attention - making eye contact is the first step in that.

    I can't say it loud enough: DUH!!

  • I've seen an applications where users had to interact with a software agent that used different 'gaze policies'.
    It's really hard to take it serious that some piece of software is looking at you. Cause you know it isn't, at least not in the way humans do. Eye-contact is very important in human-humon interaction, but in human-machine interaction, I really don't see a point in it. Just my opinion..

  • Beautiful people (Score:5, Funny)

    by Dog and Pony ( 521538 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:20AM (#4738417)
    I wonder if the findings could explain why the 'beautiful people' have such influence on the mass media."

    No, they have this influence because your hormones tell you that if you pay attention, you might be allowed to mate with the alpha male/female.

    Sadly, they are wrong. :)

  • Wow, anyone... (Score:4, Funny)

    by C0LDFusion ( 541865 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:20AM (#4738419) Journal
    ...ever see Blade Runner? Coming soon! Brand new Voight-Kampf machines to use your eyes to test your emotional responses.

  • Duh. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Omkar ( 618823 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:22AM (#4738433) Homepage Journal
    News flash: Eye contact is important to communication. The more you look at someone, the better you'll communicate. Why did someone waste time and money analyzing this? A better idea: analyze vision processes in a human/comp. two way communication experiment to better design man/machine interfaces.

    Eye Contact will influence Man-machine interaction...lol, that should be obvious to the meanest intelligence.

  • 'Beautiful people' do NOT have influence! (Score:4, Insightful)

    by RealityProphet ( 625675 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:23AM (#4738434)
    I don't know how CowboyNeal could even infer that from the article, but its wrong anyway! Beautiful people do not have any influence with the mass media. Famous people, on the other hand, might. I would not include Barbra Streisand, or Arnold Schwarzenegger in my list of beautiful people, but when they say something, the media listens. And the media listens, because, like it or not, the mass population wants to hear what they say. If people didn't want to know, the media would stop broadcasting it.

    • Re:'Beautiful people' do NOT have influence! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by kfg ( 145172 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:43AM (#4738502)
      Notice that the words 'beautiful people' were enclosed in these things ''. That's because the words are not to be interpreted literally.

      "Beautiful People" are not necessarily "attractive people."

      BS is, in fact, a prime example of that. She is the nearly the perfect example of what a 'beautiful person' is, even though she has a face a horse couldn't love, even if it were her mother.

      The term 'beautiful people' is what is know as an *idiom.* An idiom is a word or phrase who's meaning is not literal. Idiom's make translation from one language to another a hellish undertaking at times and explains some of the more bizarre behaviours of the fish.

      As it happens fame is one of the things that might make one 'beautiful' . . . no matter one's looks. Financial status, jetsetting, aquaintences, where you summer and a number of other factors go into making one 'beautiful.'

      Oh, and clothes of course. 'Beautiful people' wholeheartedly believe the maxim "Clothes make the man." If your clothes are beautiful *you* are beautiful.

      At the opposite extreme, and relying on a fictional charecter ( but real person )Kelly Bundy was hot, sexy and otherwise extremely attractive. Kelly Bundy was not a 'beautiful person.' Kelly Bundy was a tramp. Kelly Bundy would not be allowed to serve a beautiful person tea. . . unless maybe she were wearing Gucci.

      KFG
      • I disagree. Beautiful people were in these things, "", called quotes or quotation marks, not because it was some idiom that wasn't to be taken literally, but because one person's view of physical, primal, literal, skin-deap beauty, may not be another's. With that said, I still think CowboyNeal got it wrong: most people would probably not think BS was beautiful, but she sure is famous.
      • I beleive the work you are looking for is charisma.
      • Actually, Britney is beautiful. Why? Because she, or at least her face, is symetrical; and symetry is a benchmark for beauty (as is the ratio's between different body measurements...which she has too).

        Now what's interesting is that people get accorded status when they rise to the top of a group. And when they rise to the top of a group, that helps their selfesteem, which causes a positive feedback loop. This is one of the reasons there are so many communities; that creates all the more groups where people can rise to the top of their community and feel good about themselves.

        As for Britney and Kelly, I sence a resentment rising from the fact that you didn't get to bonk them :) But no matter...the rest of us didn't either ;)
    • Considering that the mass media is fundamentally in the business of "selling eyeballs to advertisers," it seems quite reasonable to infer that this research would help them. Gotta attract the eyeballs to be able to sell them...
  • Wondering if this study could shape some ideas in driving Video Conferencing technology - I know from my experiences the most offputting aspect of participating in VCs is people not looking at you while talking, due to the locations of monitors and cameras not synching.

    As an aside, why was the link from the main page to the ScienceDaily web site, when the article clearly has a link to the original from Queens University [queensu.ca] ????

  • big deal (Score:5, Insightful)

    by g4dget ( 579145 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:27AM (#4738447)
    Yes, eye contact is important in human-to-human interactions--that's been known scientifically for decades, and anecdotally for millennia. It's also been known that eye contact, as well a facial expressions, are very important in video conferencing, and furthermore, that they suffer greatly if there is any appreciable delay.

    The notion, however, that human computer interaction becomes better by mimicking human to human interaction seems ridiculous. Computers are tools. I no more want to engage in social eye contact with a computer than I want to with my drill, my car, or my vacuum cleaner.

    Eye contact is used to regulate attention in social situations--a precious commodity among humans. But when it comes to tools and appliances, I expect them to pay full attention to me all the time, but to respond only when spoken to. None of that involves eye contact.

    • I agree with you on interaction with the current generation of electronic devices, but in future eye contact with "virtual people" will become a key driver. This is true in two arenas - in a 'virtual human' environment (ala Evercrack), and for interaction with computer generated faces (think the ads in Minority Report that look you in the eye, and talk directly to you using your name, and personally tailored messages)
      • (think the ads in Minority Report that look you in the eye, and talk directly to you using your name, and personally tailored messages)

        An even better reason not to incorporate eye contact into interaction with machines.

    • The notion, however, that human computer interaction becomes better by mimicking human to human interaction seems ridiculous. Computers are tools.

      The key is when you use computers to communicate with other people in real-time. In that situation, being able to communicate non-verbally as well as with words becomes useful.

    • I expect them to pay full attention to me all the time

      I agree. And so does my waffle iron. Isn't that right, Smokey?

    • Supposing you were talking to an android, how would you expect it to know you were talking to it? I think you would probably look at it. You could just say its name every time, but that would get annoying. Also, there could be instances when the android needed to pay attention to more than one person. Eye contact could be used to let you know who its paying attention to at any given instant.

  • ya (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Beautiful people are in thge mass media in order to make all the normal people (i.e. people can't spend all day in the gym working on their abs and getting plastic surgery) to make the normal people feel inferior or inadaquate so that they consume things t feel accepted.

    "Oh i'm so fat! i better by these designer clothes so i feel attractive"

    "Oh darn if i want to be accepted by my peers i better buy these tommy "the sweatshop" hilfiger jeans!"

    As long as the masses stay scared and insecure about themselves they will consume in an attempt to raise their social status.

    When you actually talk to any of the "beautiful people" they are usually super lame and phony. One does not stay abreast of the latest trendy bull the corps are marketing by being anything but a transparent phony.
  • Say it aint so, Joe! Say it aint so!

  • What about cultural differences? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by paulio ( 24772 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:36AM (#4738479)
    I wonder about how cultural differences in eye contact would affect this kind of study. I can't imagine that in many parts of Asia, where eye contact is rude in many contexts, that the results would be the same.
    • needing to get out of the lab more. They tend to get myopic. They can't see past the walls and they take their study subjects and culture as universal truths.

      Sometimes this leads to problems down the road when any schlub on the street could have told them the problem right off the bat.

      I'd say these lab boys need to go out and make some eye contact with people.

      KFG
  • I need a software to improve my eye contact performance!

  • Earlier results (Score:4, Funny)

    by Waffle Iron ( 339739 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:39AM (#4738488)
    We shouldn't forget the pioneering research in this field done by N. Kruschev, who discovered in the 1960s that one of the most effective ways to garner attention at a large meeting is to take off your shoe and bang it angrily on the table.

    Even though his method is much more effective than eye contact, it is rarely used today.

    • Re:Earlier results (Score:5, Interesting)

      by kfg ( 145172 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:51AM (#4738539)
      Mr. Kruschev did not take off his shoe and bang it angrily on the table.

      Oh, he banged a shoe angrily on the table all right, but *he didn't take it off.*

      If you examine film footage of the event very carefully you'll notice one very interesting fact, Senor Kruschev is *wearing both his shoes.*

      Messr. Kruschev was not just some angry ape given to bizarre fits of pique. One did not survive under the Stalinist purges to rise to party leadership by not being a very clever, perceptive and *manipulative* man.

      The Honorable Kruschev actually *brought a shoe to the meeting hall with him* with the express intent of banging it on the table! The whole thing was cleverly staged.

      KFG
      • Another interesting tidbit about Kruschev is the mistranslation of the phrase "We will bury you". (Another popular misconception is that he said this during the shoe-banging incident)
        A more accurate translation would have been something like "we will be at your burial" with the more passive meaning that communism will outlast democracy, not the active meaning, suggested by 'bury', that they planned to kill us.
        My source for this was my Russian professor in college but I just also found some colloborating evidence in this paper [ttt.org] about the difficulties of translation.

  • Keep Meetings Productive (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Bob9113 ( 14996 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @10:45AM (#4738510) Homepage
    Seems like a recipe for keeping meetings productive. Make lots of eye contact with the people who are most likely to affect the meeting outcome you desire. For me, this is usually making the meeting end quickly.
  • incorectly identifiying cause and efect,
    the more looks you get, the more you feal it is
    your turn, hte more you try and push your influence over others..
  • Check out the hum@n medi@ l@b [queensu.ca] for more information about the projects and people.

    Shouts outs to Jeff, Alex, Ryan, Changuk, Roel, and Edwin!

    It is lucky that our URL does not appear in the body of the article or the cube would have been slashdotted! :-)

  • Ok, I don't get it, my PDA and cell phone . . . (Score:5, Funny)

    by kfg ( 145172 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @11:05AM (#4738575)
    already obey my every whim when I interact with them. They are my virtual comunications slaves.

    Why, I can literally * push their buttons* and they respond as I will, when I will them too.

    Frankly I find the idea of having to make "eye contact" with an inanimate object kind of creepy.

    I can just see it now, I've made "eye contact" with a sweet young thing, she turns out to be compliant, we handshake, interface and we're just about to get to the good parts involving "sockets" when she "makes eye contact" ( today's catch phrase for "look at") with me and says:

    "Not in front of the phone. I can't do it with someone watching."

    KFG
  • This guy should look into the futures traders in the Chicago pits. One of the ways they know who is trading with someone across the room and surrounded by others, is through eye contact. The few I have met have said that they just get really good at telling if you are looking at them or the guy right behind them.

  • specious reasoning (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Did it ever occur to these researchers that maybe the reason someone receives 'eye time' because they are already established as the dominant participant in the exchange? It could be from physical appearance, (perceived) intelligence and expertise in the subject at hand, etc. etc. It just seems like they are missing the point, and mixing up cause and effect.

  • Uh-oh.. (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    So, when are they gonna build the first robot who takes notice of eye contact?

    Man: Robot! Clean my dishes.

    Robot: My function is not cleaning, master.

    Man: Oh! Mr. Robot is too important for cleaning now! *rolls eyes*

    Robot: Must.. kill... humans...
  • I can't wait till I get a new laptop and every morning I hear...

    You lookin' at me!? Are YOU lookin' at ME?!!
  • People are stupid. Large groups of people are stupider. Large groups of stupid people fueled by passive entertainment with beautiful people are stupidest. Its a tiered approach...

  • Old Eye Contact Joke (Score:3, Funny)

    by cowboy junkie ( 35926 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @11:39AM (#4738694) Homepage
    "They say you should make eye contact with a woman you're interested in. Well, there's a fine line between eye contact and the piercing stare of a psychopath."

  • Scientists discover the freakin' obvious (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Scientists discover eye contact! News at eleven!

    Nerds on Slashdot given another opportunity to wallow in self-pity by railing against the "beautiful people"!

  • Culturally biased (Score:4, Interesting)

    by agentk ( 74906 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @11:54AM (#4738762)
    Eye contact is highly cultural: direct eye contact has different meanings to different people. In Europe and America it signifies attentiveness and interest, but elsewhere it can mean aggression and disrespect --

    This kind of research is important in developing better computer interface, and human communication tools, but these tools need to adapt to many styles and codes of communication, as well.

  • Do people still make eye contact? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by whereiswaldo ( 459052 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @11:56AM (#4738771) Journal
    Do people still make eye contact?

    In some areas, eye contact is considered threatening. In others, it is considered a show of sincerity and honesty.

    I come from an area where eye contact is good, and unfortunately I think I am living in an area where it makes people uncomfortable. In turn, it is uncomfortable for me when I make people uncomfortable.

    It would be interesting to see a study on personality types versus eye contact and geographic area vs. eye contact and how to deal with differences in perceptions of eye contact. This would help me feel more comfortable in daily life and from what I gather would help a lot of others, too.

    Any interesting sources anyone can point to?
  • That word--I don't think it means what you think it means.

  • the most comfortable spot in the room (Score:5, Interesting)

    by dandelion_wine ( 625330 ) on Saturday November 23, 2002 @12:14PM (#4738866) Journal
    Hehehehe. This reminds me of a little experiment done to our social psych professor. It demonstrates the power of attention, but also shaping (gradual conditioning) in a rather insidious form.

    The class had been studying shaping -- where you don't condition for an end behaviour but for an intermediate, easier one. Then when you have that, you shape to the next behaviour in a chain, repeating as necessary. That way, you can condition complicated behaviours that would occur too infrequently by chance to reward the pattern.

    The idea was to pay our prof more or less attention the more or less he did a specific behaviour, and we chose teaching from one side of the stage rather than the other (in this case, reinforcing stage left, our right). Was probably good that only about 20 people were in on it, otherwise it might have been too obvious. But when he'd wander to our left, we'd stare at our books, scratch our heads, frown, slouch, and never make eye contact. If he moved to our right, we'd sit up a little straighter, look at him, and basically show we were paying attention. Well, if you ever have a glance around a sizable class, you know there are seldom many people giving their complete attention anyway, unless the prof is riveting. It only took a few classes to have him spending most of his time to the right of the lectern. We kept this up for nearly a month, at which point he basically taught the class from a window sill on the right edge of the room. Most impressivly, he didn't know what was going on. Most likely he just felt "most comfortable" there. Hehehehehehe.

    People love to slag psychology but everyone acknowledges the importance of things like "eye contact." It's time we started giving these things some credit. Like the previous poster noting the power a "team of salespeople" could have, this can be powerful stuff.
      • Did tell him -- though we were a little afraid he'd be pissed off. Typical social psych prof -- very nervous in person and a little shy. But super nice guy, and after a small initial shock, he grinned and said he liked it.

        I managed to get 5 people in my upper year Intro to Clinical class to try it again (me and four others). This was a seminar of only about 20 people so I figured the number might do. We always had the impression this prof was playing mind games with us, so we decided to give this a try. It failed miserably. He played along for a class and then told us it'd take more than some fourth years to "shape him". Said he saw it in ten minutes, and I wouldn't be surprised. Guy used to do (maybe still does) hypnotic regression for the RCMP.

        So one success and one failure. Any sceptics can try this themselves. I'm guessing the average person won't recognize it as easily as this guy. He was a wiz.

        I'm wondering at this point if some of the other techniques used in hypnosis might be helpful. I know that some are taught at sales seminars. Observe your target and try to breathe at the same rate, blink at the same rate, use similar gestures (or none if they use none), etc. You'd think such blatant imitation would unnerve the person but it has the opposite effect. Haven't thought about that in awhile, but will have to give it a try over the next little while. :)
        • Speaking of this topic, I saw a very interesting lecture on HCI on the UWTV channel on the satellite.

          Basically they guy had great success applying social-interaction techniques to HCI. For example, people responded to computer flattery, even though they knew it was impossible for the computer to make such judgements!

          He used CS grad students, so there was no misunderstandings about the computer's abilities.

          He set up some game, and had the computer either not give any feedback, or to give flattery or insults. For the people where the computer gave feedback, he told the people that the part of the program that gave feedback wasn't implemented yet, so it just gave dummy messages instead.

          The people who were flattered gave higher assements of their own performance, but surprisingly, they rated the game as better! The insulted people thought their performance was not as good, and also they disliked the game more.

          The professor has also set up research involving quid-pro-quo situations with computers also. Basically when the computer does something right, people are a lot more likely to help the computer out for helping them.

          People also are more likely to help out computers that are in the same "family" as the computer that helped them. He set up two PCs and after the computer did something for them, it asked them to go to the other PC and help the computer by doing some comparisions of pictures or some nonesense. People were more likely to help the other PC (did more comparisions) when the first PC helped them.

          The surprising result here is when they substituted the other PC with a Mac running identical software, the people weren't as likely to help it!

          Anyway, it's interesting the ways that people subconsiously give human traits to computers, even if on a consious level they "know better" (CS students).
          • Now that is interesting. I did my thesis on something called the "illusion of control" -- you give people clear cues that they have no control over an outcome, and they'll think they do anyway. It's a little like superstition, but the important bit is you're not fooling them. You are clear with them that they have no control. Other people tested it with rats. We used intro psych students. Manipulated things like having a choice or not (but clearly showed that neither would affect the outcome), and having any input at all resulted in people somehow thinking they had control. I bet it factors into all kinds of human behaviour.

            So here we have computers flattering people and people who should know better being flattered. Wow. Wait till the sales people start applying that. "Wow!" says my latest video game. "You're really good!"

            Reminds me also of a little program called "Freud" that I remember from my high school days. I remember a friend insisting it was pronounced "frood". Anyway. It was a very basic expert program. It recognized words and a little structure in any question you asked it, and it would respond, with support. A primitive counselling program. Also, it had a face, and eyebrows that would wiggle while it thought (and naturally, it was programmed with a fair amount of tongue-in-cheek psychoanalytic humour). In any case, if I remember correctly, "Freud" became the scourge of many a workplace. People wasted hours, in bits and pieces, talking to it, gleaning whatever they could from its sometimes nonsensical support. Or maybe just liking the attention; I don't know. I should have learned that lesson long ago in the bar scene. People say too much. Just gotta wiggle your eyebrows and say: "Dat's fascinating. Tell me more." :)
    • I'm really interested in your example. Do you have any footage of this that I might use in my talks? Please reply directly to email
  • Thanks to everyone making such a big deal about eye contact, I *REALLY* suck at interviews what with my curses of congenital nystagmus + lazy eye. Too bad people can't get hired for their technical skills and non-eye contact related communications skills rather than how much eye contact they have with an interviewer. Now if the interviewer was a computer or robot or something that might be a different story. Anyway, people (mainly job interviewers) need to realize that not everyone can look people straight in the eye for extended periods of time and that just because they don't/can't it doesn't mean they're dishonest/uninterested/whatever.
    • This may be insensitive but i've found that the only thing that can set you back more than a disability is to be bitter about that disability. No doubt you've had numerous inter-personal problems with this throughout your life. But if I may suggest that you make your would-be employers aware of your condition before the interview (in email or whatever) and the affect (not effect :) it frequently has on people, they may be willing to fight against their natural inclination to over interpret your gaze.

  • what about cell phones (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Personally, I avoid talking on the phone because of the unpersonal communication in a human familiar form. I can't help but feel like I am talking to an appliance and feel stupid. Partly because of the awkwardness of the fact that speaking with my voice is a personal form of communication over an unpersonal medium, there is some loss of emotional interaction.

    On the other hand, I have no trouble communicating over mediums like IRC, Instant Messaging, email, etc... or in person.

    Eye contact may help someone like me, but doubtfully... to me it would just be a device with a face. Based on what I see when i'm out or driving is that the majority of the people who are talking on a cell phone are perfectly content with "talking to themselves" as I always put it because it is essentially what they are doing. I especially get a kick out of seeing people walk around with those headsets, clearly advertising themselves as too self-involved to be bothered with distracting themselves with cell phones but willing to make themselves look like fools talking to themselves.

  • language (Score:1, Offtopic)

    by sstory ( 538486 )
    Slashdot is my favorite site. It has the best content. That said, I often cringe while reading this site, because the language skills of many techies are borderline-retarded. Not a week goes by that I don't see a story--not a post, but a story--on Slashdot which uses 'effect' for 'affect' or vice-versa. I can easily picture an army of Jeff K's out there: "I am teh computar mastar! I am very smart persan!"
    • no, it's on topic, because of this sentence from the story: "More importantly, the findings show how the amount of eye contact one receives in a group will effect the number of turns one can take in a discussion."
  • This is interesting but what about the fact that in diffent cultures eye contact is considered rude or a chalange of ones authority?
    Will the software have some sort of flag that would reverse the values if the user happens to be japanese or certian native american tribes?
    Also what about people who are shy or have low self esteem. They would become electronic outcasts just as in real life.
  • I'm amazed that we're 85 comments into this discussion about paying attention and no one has noticed the incorrect wording in the lead item . . .

    "More importantly, the findings show how the amount of eye contact one receives in a group will effect the number of turns one can take in a discussion. What is interesting about the study his how it will effect the design of the future communication devices . . . "

    Both times it should be "affect" rather than "effect."

  • ...are more suitable for technical and business discussions -- you still can have a populartiy-contest atmosphere on IRC, but it won't depend on people's habits of moving their eyes and other irrelevant and easy to skew by minor external factors and individual peculiarities things.
  • This reminds me of that old "n% of communication is nonverbal", business (usually quoted as 90%+, though I think the percentile usage is a bit pretentious). For most topics, I don't mind the phone, because at least I get voice inflection. For important contacts, though, or when I'm not sure of my footing (usually opposite-sex stuff) I want to be able to read facial expressions. And email?! Oh, don't ever try to work out a disagreement with your sig other over email if you can help it. Disastrous potential for misunderstandings.
  • I've sworn at computers for years. Now I can stare them down, too.

  • In short, at least give the penguin a fair viewing. If you still don't
    like it, that's ok: that's why I'm boss. I simply know better than you do.
    -- Linus "what, me arrogant?" Torvalds, on c.o.l.advocacy

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  • [In 'Doctor' mode], I spent a good ten minutes telling Emacs what I
    thought of it. (The response was, 'Perhaps you could try to be less
    abusive.')
    -- Matt Welsh

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