A study on the relationship of shyness and gaze

Abstract

Sixty-four women, either scoring high or low on Trait Shyness Scale, were selected from a population of 130 junior college students. An experiment with a 2×2×2 factorial design was conducted, with shyness (high vs. low), interviewer gaze (high vs. low), and interviewer sex (man vs. woman) as its factors. Sitting directly in front of a subject, an interviewer read questions one by one from a list. Two trained judges coded the subject's gaze and speech through a one-way mirror, and later by watching videotaped records. Results showed that high shyness persons gazed less than the others in the high interviewer-gaze condition. In addition, high shyness women tended to talk less than low shyness women.