Attention coupling as a prerequisite for social interaction

This paper proposes, "attention coupling", that is spatio-temporal coordination of each other\´s attention, as a prerequisite for human-robot social interaction, where the human interactant attributes mental states to the robot, and possibly vice versa. As a realization of attention coupling we implemented on our robots the capability of eye-contact (mutually looking into each other\´s eyes) and joint attention (looking at a shared target together). Observation of the interaction with human babies/children showed that the robots with the attention coupling capability facilitated in the babies/children social behavior, including showing, giving, and verbal interactions like asking questions.