Modeling Human Communication Dynamics for Virtual Human - Coverbal Synchrony in Human-Machine Interaction - page 383

As we have already shown in this topic chapter, modeling human
communication dynamics is important for both recognition and
prediction. One other important advantage of these computational
models is the automatic analysis of human behaviors. Studying
interactions is grueling and time-consuming work. The rule of thumb
in the field is that each recorded minute of interaction takes an hour
or more to analyze. Moreover, many social cues are subtle, and not
easily noticed by even the most attentive psychologists.
By being able to automatically and efficiently analyze a large
quantity of human interactions, and detect relevant patterns, these
new tools will enable psychologists and linguists to find hidden
behavioral patterns which may be too subtle for the human eye to
detect, or may be just too rare during human interactions. A concrete
example is the recent work which studied engagement and rapport
between speakers and listeners, specifically examining a person's
backchannel feedback during conversation (Ward and Tsukahara,
2000). This research revealed new predictive cues related to gaze shifts
and specific spoken words which were not identified by previous
psycho-linguistic studies. These results not only give an inspiration
for future behavioral studies but also make possible a new generation
of robots and virtual humans able to convey gestures and expressions
at the appropriate times.
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