Neurocognitive and behavioral constituents of nonverbal speaker-listener attunement during science communication

在科学传播的背景下，非语言交际如何影响公众演讲？公开演讲是一种因人而异的技巧，它会极大地影响听众在演讲中学到的东西。人们通常不认识到的是，非语言交流在说话者的接受程度中起着关键作用。非语言交流是指人们在没有语言的情况下进行交流的所有方式，包括肢体语言、手势、眼神交流和语调。熟练的演讲者使用非语言交流来抓住和保持听众的注意力，创造积极的印象，并建立融洽的关系。但听众也可以用非语言方式与演讲者交流。例如，一个紧张地开始演讲的演讲者可能会注意到听众避免目光接触。这可能会引发说话者的压力，从而导致思想混乱。这个项目将使用虚拟现实（VR）来研究这种演讲者-听众的协调如何影响公众对科学话题的接受。VR将允许我们模拟公共演讲的场景，并测量演讲者和观众的反应。这项研究将促进我们对非语言因素作为学习的推动因素的理解，并可能为提高公共演讲带来新的方法。这一点很重要，因为公开演讲是21世纪最重要的工作技能之一，而且VR技术在交流方面正变得越来越流行。该项目将使用VR实验性地操纵和测试演讲者-听众调谐如何影响科学传播背景下公众演讲的接受。研究人员提出了一种将生物行为测量与vr辅助操作相结合的新方法，以解开演讲者和听众如何通过非语言社会信号相互影响的问题。具体来说，该项目将量化演讲者行为的非语言成分，这些非语言成分会影响听众的神经生理反应、主观感知和客观结果。该项目还将研究通过VR技术操纵观众的行为如何影响演讲者的神经生理过程、应对行为和成功沟通的总体衡量标准。除了在生理主观和行为结果上测试关于演讲者-听众协调的假设之外，这项研究还将产生一个演讲数据库，该数据库将用所有测量方法进行注释，并允许研究演讲者如何回应听众以及哪些因素预测参与度和学习。结合外展和教育的努力，这项研究将为通信、生物行为和技术学习系统的交叉领域的新发展打开大门。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

How does nonverbal communication affect public speaking in the context of science communication? Public speaking is a skill that varies between speakers and which drastically impacts how much audiences learn during a talk. What is not often appreciated is that nonverbal communication plays a key role in how well a speaker is received. Nonverbal communication refers to all the ways people communicate without words, including body language, gestures, eye contact, and tone of voice. Skilled speakers use nonverbal communication to capture and hold the audience's attention, create positive impressions, and build rapport. But audiences also communicate with speakers nonverbally. For example, a speaker who starts a speech nervously may notice that the audience avoids eye contact. This can trigger stress in the speaker, which can lead to derailed thoughts. This project will use virtual reality (VR) to study how this speaker-audience attunement influences the reception of public talks about science topics. VR will allow us to create simulations of public speaking situations, and to measure the responses of both speakers and audiences. This research will advance our understanding of nonverbal factors as enablers for learning, and it could lead to new ways for improving public speaking. This is important because public speaking is one of the top 21st-century job skills and also because VR technology is becoming increasingly popular for communication. This project will use VR to experimentally manipulate and test how speaker-audience attunement influences the reception of public talks in the context of science communication. The investigators propose a new approach that integrates bio-behavioral measurement with VR-assisted manipulation to disentangle how speakers and audiences influence each other via nonverbal social signals. Specifically, this project will quantify the nonverbal components of the speaker’s behavior that affect neurophysiological audience responses, subjective perceptions, and objective outcomes. The project will also study how the behavior of audiences, which are manipulated via VR technology, affects the speakers’ neurophysiological processes, coping behavior, and overall measures of successful communication. In addition to testing the hypotheses about speaker-audience attunement on physiological subjective, and behavioral outcomes, this research will yield a database of speeches that are annotated with all measures and allows studying how speakers respond to audiences and which factors predict engagement and learning. Together with outreach and education efforts, this research will open the door to new developments at the intersection of communication, bio-behavioral, and technological learning systems.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.