Texting, e-mailing, IMing, DMing. These methods are great ways to ___1___—but they also carry the risk of miscommunication. The lack of vocal ___2___ is one reason, but there are other more subtle cues we lack in digital conversation.

In a recent study, seven pairs of subjects controlled virtual avatars. One avatar described a word without mentioning the actual word. For example, for the word "water," you might say "wet." The other avatar tried to guess the word

Researchers found the pairs were much more successful in communicating the word when both avatars used hand gestures, as opposed to when one, or both, of the two avatars ___3___.

The study is in the journal Public Library of Science One.

In a second experiment the researchers had some of the “guessing” avatars ___4___ as pre-recorded animations. So the avatars’ gestures while listening did not necessarily match the gestures of real listeners. And their communication was less successful than pairs that ___5___ with genuine gestures.

The study provides evidence that communication is really two-way. And that active listening, with appropriate gestures, can be as important for understanding as what’s being said.

【視聽版科學(xué)小組榮譽(yù)出品】
keep in touch inflection stayed completely still portrayed interacted
發(fā)短信、發(fā)郵件、網(wǎng)上聊天、玩游戲等等等等都是保持聯(lián)系的好方法——同時(shí)也有可能誤傳信息。聽不到對(duì)方聲音是一個(gè)原因，在這種數(shù)字交談中我們還缺少很多提示。 最近一項(xiàng)研究中，7對(duì)研究對(duì)象控制圖標(biāo)然后交流。其中一個(gè)人描述詞義，另一個(gè)人猜。例如一個(gè)人設(shè)置“wet”圖標(biāo)，另一個(gè)人猜“water”。 研究人員發(fā)現(xiàn)，兩個(gè)人都使用手勢(shì)圖標(biāo)的人溝通起來更有默契，只有一個(gè)人用或者兩個(gè)都不用，那溝通起來就沒那么順利。 《公共科學(xué)圖書館?綜合》上刊登了這項(xiàng)研究報(bào)告。 另一項(xiàng)實(shí)驗(yàn)中，研究人員讓猜詞一方設(shè)置預(yù)先錄制的圖像，因此在猜詞過程中，手勢(shì)圖像就會(huì)和對(duì)方描述不匹配，效果也就沒有一問一答比手勢(shì)的組好了。 這項(xiàng)研究表明，交流是雙向的。和說話內(nèi)容相比，認(rèn)真聽對(duì)方說話，外加適當(dāng)?shù)氖謩?shì)對(duì)于理解對(duì)方來說也一樣重要。