The dual function of social gaze

Abstract

Ears cannot speak, lips cannot hear, but eyes can both signal and perceive. For human beings, this dual function makes the eyes a remarkable tool for social interaction. For psychologists trying to understand eye movements, however, their dual function causes a fundamental ambiguity. In order to contrast signaling and perceiving functions of social gaze, we manipulated participants' beliefs about social context as they looked at the same stimuli. Participants watched videos of faces of higher and lower ranked people, while they themselves were filmed. They believed either that the recordings of them would later be seen by the people in the videos or that no-one would see them. This manipulation significantly changed how participants responded to the social rank of the target faces. Specifically, when they believed that the targets would later be looking at them, and so could use gaze to signal information, participants looked proportionally less at the eyes of the higher ranked targets. We conclude that previous claims about eye movements and face perception that are based on a single social context can only be generalized with caution. A complete understanding of face perception needs to address both functions of social gaze.

Gazing at me: the importance of social meaning in understanding direct-gaze cues

“…Participants who believe they cannot be seen gaze at the eyes of a high-ranking person, while participants who believe they can be seen do not [73]. Adolescent participants engaged mPFC more at times when they believed that their face could be seen by others of the same age (as cued by a simple red light) than at times when they believed their face could not be seen (red light off) [74].…”

When does power trigger approach motivation? Threats and the role of perceived control in the power domain

“…Power holders display more nonverbal behavior (e.g., facial expressions and hand/arm gestures) than do their powerless counterparts (Hall et al, ). When interactions are initiated, powerful individuals stand closer to their partners and look more frequently at others' eyes (Dean, Willis, & Hewitt, ; Gobel, Kim, & Richardson, ). Power thus leads to greater self‐expression, authenticity, and disinhibited behavior in social interactions, as an attempt to influence others and to pursue salient goals (Guinote et al, ; Guinote & Chen, ).…”

Social anxiety modulates visual exploration in real life – but not in the laboratory

“…For instance, Laidlaw, Foulsham, Kuhn, and Kingstone () found participants to frequently look at the videotape of a confederate, but to avoid looking at a live confederate when she was present in the room. Along these lines, Gobel, Kim, and Richardson () found participants to avoid looking at the eyes of higher ranked individuals in a videotape when they believed the depicted person would in return later see a videotape of them. These effects of the (real or imagined) presence of another person on one's gaze behaviour are typically explained by a dual function of gaze, that is by the fact that orienting one's gaze serves both to redirect overt attention and to signal one's intentions to others (Gobel et al ., ; Risko, Richardson, & Kingstone, ).…”