1 Introduction to the Special Issue on Gaze in Human Robot Communication

Advancements in robot design and supporting technologies such as computer vision and speech recognition increasingly enable robots to interact with humans in a robust and natural manner. These interaction capabilities place new expectations on robots to correctly produce and interpret social behaviors that humans use in face-to-face communication. One of the most salient behaviors that this type of interaction involves is gaze. Current research on gaze in robotics is informed by a history of research in psychology and related fields and primarily comprised of work from the burgeoning fields of human-robot interaction and social robotics. The exploration of the role of gaze in human-robot communication is the topic of this special issue. Various approaches toward a better understanding of how to utilize the human predisposition for interpreting social cues transmitted via gaze to build better social robots are illustrated in the articles presented.