Analyzing gaze and hand movement patterns in leader-follower interactions during a time-continuous cooperative...

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Science
• Human-Computer Interaction
• Social Neuroscience

Background:

• Human interactions often involve leader and follower roles, unfolding naturally.
• Gaze-hand coordination is well-studied, but less is known in interactive contexts requiring mutual action consideration.

Purpose of the Study:

• To examine predictive, planning-related gaze-hand behaviors in a naturalistic two-player game.
• To understand how leaders and followers coordinate actions and gaze in a cooperative task.

Main Methods:

• Utilized a "do-undo" tabletop game with alternating leader and follower roles.
• Recorded eye and hand movements, object trajectories, and touch sensor data.
• Combined eye tracking with multi-camera motion capture for precise temporal analysis.

Main Results:

• Eye fixations consistently preceded object manipulation across both roles.
• Leaders exhibited more frequent and earlier gaze at target objects compared to followers.
• Leaders' gaze anticipated their own actions and the follower's actions, indicating advanced planning.

Conclusions:

• Distinct decision-making and planning strategies were observed between leaders and followers.
• Leader-centric interactions, where leaders consider partner actions, highlight complex cognitive processes in collaboration.
• Findings offer insights into the cognitive mechanisms underlying everyday human interactions and joint action.