An Examination of Whether People Prefer Agents Whose Gestures Mimic Their Own

Do people prefer gestures that are similar to their own? There is evidence that in conversation, people will tend to adopt the postures, gestures and mannerisms of their interaction partners [1]. This mirroring, sometimes called the “chameleon effect”, is associated with affiliation, rapport and liking. It may be that a useful way to build rapport in human-agent/robot interaction is to have the agent/robot perform gestures similar to the human. As a step towards that, this study explores if people prefer gestures similar to their own over gestures similar to those of other people. Participants were asked to evaluate a series of agent motions, some of which mimic their own gestures, and rate their preference. A second study first showed participants videos of their own gesturing to see if self-awareness would impact their preference. Different scenarios for soliciting gesture behavior were also explored. Evidence suggests people do have some preference for motions similar to their own, but self-awareness has no effect.