Abstract
We investigated about increments in cognitive load of getting the turn and speaking out in conversation, which were hypothesized to be related to the partner’s features, especially age. In the experiment, pairs of participants, younger or older adults, performed the list completion task and tapping task simultaneously, and cognitive load during the conversation was measured by the tapping rate. In the list completion task, each participant was presented with five images from a set of six images and had to identify the one that wasn’t displayed to the participant. Tapping rates were calculated every 0.2 seconds starting 2.0 seconds before the speaking out in the list completion task. Results showed that younger adults' tapping rates just before speaking out decreased more, when the partner was an older adult. A conversation management model in which response cautiousness and bias are varied according to the partner’s feature will be proposed.
