The Cone of Direct Gaze: A Stable Trait

Janek S Lobmaier; Branislav Savic; Thomas Baumgartner; Daria Knoch

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.682395

The Cone of Direct Gaze: A Stable Trait

Front Psychol. 2021 Jun 29:12:682395. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.682395. eCollection 2021.

Authors

Janek S Lobmaier¹, Branislav Savic¹, Thomas Baumgartner¹, Daria Knoch¹

Affiliation

¹ Department of Social Neuroscience and Social Psychology, Institute of Psychology, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland.

Abstract

Direct eye gaze is a potent stimulus in social interactions and is often associated with interest and approach orientation. Yet, there is remarkable variability in the range of gaze lines that people accept as being direct. A measure that is frequently used to quantify the range of gaze angles within which an observer assumes mutual gaze is the cone of direct gaze (CoDG). While individual differences in CoDG have often been examined, studies that systematically investigate the stability of an observers' CoDG over time are scarce. In two experiments, we measured the CoDG using an established paradigm and repeated the measurement after 5 min and/or after 1 week. We found high inter-individual variation, but high agreement within participants (ICCs between 0.649 and 0.855). We conclude that the CoDG can be seen as a rather stable measure, much like a personality trait.

Keywords: Bland–Altman plot; CoDG; cone of gaze; direct gaze; individual differences; stability.