Head and Hand Movements in the Orchestration of Dialogue

Gaze and head orientation are considered to be the most important non-verbal cues people use to help manage the flow of conversation. However, if there are more than two participants, gaze and head orientation become problematic. People can only look at a single participant at a time. When speakers concurrently engage with more than one participant, they often make use of both head and hand orientation. We show two contrasts with existing findings. Firstly, people do not automatically look where the speaker is looking. Secondly, we demonstrate that hand movements are more important for the interaction than head movements. Specifically, changes in speaker hand orientation prompt quicker and more frequent responses from recipients than changes in head orientation.