Title
You cannot speak and listen at the same time: a probabilistic model of turn-taking.
Abstract
Turn-taking is a preverbal skill whose mastering constitutes an important precondition for many social interactions and joint actions. However, the cognitive mechanisms supporting turn-taking abilities are still poorly understood. Here, we propose a computational analysis of turn-taking in terms of two general mechanisms supporting joint actions: action prediction (e.g., recognizing the interlocutor's message and predicting the end of turn) and signaling (e.g., modifying one's own speech to make it more predictable and discriminable). We test the hypothesis that in a simulated conversational scenario dyads using these two mechanisms can recognize the utterances of their co-actors faster, which in turn permits them to give and take turns more efficiently. Furthermore, we discuss how turn-taking dynamics depend on the fact that agents cannot simultaneously use their internal models for both action (or messages) prediction and production, as these have different requirements--or, in other words, they cannot speak and listen at the same time with the same level of accuracy. Our results provide a computational-level characterization of turn-taking in terms of cognitive mechanisms of action prediction and signaling that are shared across various interaction and joint action domains.
Year
DOI
Venue
2017
10.1007/s00422-017-0714-1
Biological Cybernetics
Keywords
Field
DocType
Action prediction,Dialogue,Joint action,Signaling,Turn-taking
Turn-taking,Cognitive science,Precondition,Statistical model,Artificial intelligence,Cognition,Machine learning,Computational analysis,Mathematics
Journal
Volume
Issue
ISSN
111
2
1432-0770
Citations 
PageRank 
References 
1
0.35
25
Authors
4
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Francesco Donnarumma1425.89
Haris Dindo212517.49
Pierpaolo Iodice340.76
Giovanni Pezzulo451248.50