Mutual gaze, personality, and familiarity: Dual eye-tracking during conversation

Mutual gaze is an important aspect of face-to-face communication that arises from the interaction of the gaze behavior of two individuals. In this dual eye-tracking study, gaze data was collected from human conversational pairs with the goal of gaining insight into what characteristics of the conversation partners influence this behavior. We investigate the link between personality, familiarity and mutual gaze. The results found indicate that mutual gaze behavior depends on the characteristics of both partners rather than on either individual considered in isolation. We discuss the implications of these findings for the design of socially appropriate gaze controllers for robots that interact with people.