Neglect in Human Communication: Quantifying the Cost of Cell-Phone Interruptions in Face to Face Dialogs

There is a prevailing belief that interruptions using cellular phones during face to face interactions may affect severely how people relate and perceive each other. We set out to determine this cost quantitatively through an experiment performed in dyads, in a large audience in a TEDx event. One of the two participants (the speaker) narrates a story vividly. The listener is asked to deliberately ignore the speaker during part of the story (for instance, attending to their cell-phone). The speaker is not aware of this treatment. We show that total amount of attention is the major factor driving subjective beliefs about the story and the conversational partner. The effects are mostly independent on how attention is distributed in time. All social parameters of human communication are affected by attention time with a sole exception: the perceived emotion of the story. Interruptions during day-to-day communication between peers are extremely frequent. Our data should provide a note of caution, by indicating that they have a major effect on the perception people have about what they say (whether it is interesting or not . . .) and about the virtues of the people around them.

学界普遍认为，面对面互动中使用手机进行打断行为，会严重损害人际联结与双方的相互认知。本研究通过在TEDx活动现场的大型受众中开展双人实验，旨在量化评估此类打断行为带来的人际成本。实验中两名参与者之一（讲述者）会生动讲述一则故事，另一名参与者（聆听者）则需在故事讲述的部分时段刻意无视讲述者（例如，专注查看自身手机）。讲述者对此实验操控并不知情。研究结果表明，注意力总时长是影响听者对故事及对话伙伴主观评价的核心因素，且该影响基本不受注意力在时间维度上的分配方式所左右。人类交流的所有社会互动参数均受注意力时长影响，仅有一个例外：听众对故事所传递情感的感知。日常同辈间的交流中，打断行为极为常见。本研究数据表明此类行为会显著影响他人对自身所言内容（是否有趣等）以及身边同伴品行的评价，因此可为相关场景敲响警钟。