Eye gaze and visual attention as a window into leadership and followership: A review of empirical insights and future directions

Cheng, Joey T.; Gerpott, Fabiola H.; Benson, Alex J.; Bucker, Berno; Foulsham, Tom; Lansu, Tessa A. M.; Schülke, Oliver; Tsuchiya, Keiko

doi:10.1016/j.leaqua.2022.101654

Cited by 14 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 318 publications

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“…For this reason, bully-victims may observe these portraits with great focus, considering them as examples of achieving desired outcomes through intimidation and proactive aggression. This aligns with research using eye-tracking technology, suggesting a consistent inclination among individuals to focus on roles associated with high status ( Foulsham, Cheng, Tracy, Henrich, & Kingstone, 2010 ; see also the review Cheng et al, 2023 on eye-gaze and leadership).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 78%

Effects of victimization and perpetration in observing bullying scenes: an eye-tracker study

Menabò,

Caravita,

Skrzypiec

et al. 2024

International Journal of Clinical and Health Psychology

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 78%

Effects of victimization and perpetration in observing bullying scenes: an eye-tracker study

Menabò,

Caravita,

Skrzypiec

et al. 2024

International Journal of Clinical and Health Psychology

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“…Although one's empathic concern has been demonstrated to be relevant to determine reactions to injustice (Leliveld et al, 2012), less is known regarding how perceptions of offenders' and victims' social affect and cognition may influence their respective punishment and compensation. Similarly, it would be interesting to investigate whether gaze direction and emotional context are differently interpreted and acted upon when observing social interactions with imbalance power structures such as in leadership contexts (Cheng et al, 2022). Finally, the chain from social signals and contextual cues to social perception and social decision making brings important reflections regarding the treatment of nonneurotypical individuals.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Golden gazes: Gaze direction and emotional context promote prosocial behavior by increasing attributions of empathy and perspective-taking.

Micheli,

Breil,

Böckler

2024

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

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Prosocial behavior is fundamental to societies. But when and toward whom do humans act generously? We investigate the impact of a listeners' gaze direction and the emotional context of the story heard on (a) perceptions of their social cognition skills and (b) prosocial decisions toward them. In three experiments (two preregistered, N = 486), human participants witnessed prerecorded video encounters between a listener (visible) and a speaker (audible, not visible). The listener either established eye contact, averted gaze, or showed a mixed gaze pattern (gaze direction), while the speaker told a neutral or negatively valenced autobiographic episode (emotional context). Participants rated the listeners' empathy and perspective-taking after each video and played the trust game (Study 1) or the dictator game (Study 2) with the listener. Replicating previous findings, occasional gaze avoidance, especially during negative narrations, increased attributions of social understanding to the listener. Critically, mediation analyses revealed that listeners perceived as empathic and taking perspective were ultimately treated with more trust and generosity in strategic and nonstrategic economic games, suggesting that social signals and contextual cues can serve as an indication of another's reputation, thereby promoting indirect reciprocity. Last, in Study 3, we show that emotional context, but not listeners' gaze behavior, promoted the spread of generosity toward anonymous, previously unobserved individuals in a dictator game, driven by social cognition skills attributed to the listener. We conclude that social signals and contextual cues can be important drivers of cooperation in societies via mechanisms such as indirect reciprocity and social contagion of generosity.

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“…Whereas the integration of attentional communication with leadership theories is well‐advanced (Cheng et al., 2022), other areas remain relatively undeveloped. For example, given the importance of attentional communication in achieving socially appropriate and even intimate behavior, the relative lack of recent studies investigating the role of attention in affective relationships is surprising (Burgoon et al., 2022).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Intriguingly, we tend to look more at people of whom we have a positive impression, based for example, on their perceived social status or relevance (Dietze & Knowles, 2016). As a case in point, participants watching the videos of group interactions preferentially look at the individual that they recognize (and is recognized by the group) as the group leader (Cheng et al, 2013(Cheng et al, , 2022Foulsham et al, 2010;Gerpott et al, 2018). Such attentional preference for leaders is so consistent that it is often considered a marker of leadership (Capozzi et al, 2019;Cheng et al, 2022;van Vugt, 2014).…”

Section: Attentional Engagementmentioning

confidence: 99%

The effects of visual attention on social behavior

Capozzi,

Kingstone

2023

Social & Personality Psych

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Psychology has made tremendous strides in understanding the effects that social stimuli have on attention. However, one aspect that has received relatively less consideration is the role that attention plays in social interactions. The present review examines how attentional orienting, engagement, and communication affect and shape a diverse array of social processes, including person perception, discrimination, and group structures. Specifically, the empirical evidence reviewed here points to the notions that (1) attentional orienting mediates learning and acquisition of others' attitudes and reflects or reinforces the use of stereotypical social information; (2) attentional engagement increases the accuracy of impression formation and modulates impression valence (positive vs. negative) depending on contextual and cultural factors; (3) attentional communication conveys socially appropriate behavior depending on interpersonal factors such as familiarity, intimacy, and social status. Overall, this review reveals that the links between cognitive and social psychology are strong and bidirectional, binds that hold the potential for many new and exciting discoveries in the near future.

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Eye gaze and visual attention as a window into leadership and followership: A review of empirical insights and future directions

Cited by 14 publications

References 318 publications

Effects of victimization and perpetration in observing bullying scenes: an eye-tracker study

Effects of victimization and perpetration in observing bullying scenes: an eye-tracker study

Golden gazes: Gaze direction and emotional context promote prosocial behavior by increasing attributions of empathy and perspective-taking.

The effects of visual attention on social behavior

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