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Audience-contingent variation in action demonstrations for humans and computers
Jonathan S Herberg1, Megan M Saylor, Palis Ratanaswasd
1Department of Psychology and Human Development, Vanderbilt University.
Cognitive Science
|May 19, 2011
Summary
People adapt their action demonstrations based on audience. They use knowledge-based (top-down) cues for humans and sensory-based (bottom-up) cues for computers, showing audience awareness in communication.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Science
- Human-Computer Interaction
- Developmental Psychology
Background:
- Individuals modify action demonstrations based on audience processing capabilities.
- Demonstrations can facilitate either bottom-up (sensory) or top-down (knowledge-based) processing.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate how actors modify action demonstrations for audiences with varying intentional reasoning capacities.
- To compare demonstrations for human audiences (adults, toddlers) versus a non-anthropomorphic computer system.
Main Methods:
- Actors demonstrated complex actions to different audiences.
- Analysis focused on modifications facilitating sensory-based versus knowledge-based processing.
- Comparison of motion characteristics (e.g., punctuated, wide-ranging) between audience types.
Main Results:
- Action demonstrations for human audiences showed more top-down modifications.
- Demonstrations for the computer audience featured more simple perceptual (bottom-up) modifications.
- Computer-directed actions were more punctuated and had wider motion ranges.
Conclusions:
- People adjust their communication strategies based on the audience's cognitive abilities.
- Action demonstration adapts to facilitate either sensory or knowledge-based understanding.
- This highlights the nuanced consideration of audience in human communication and HCI.
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