Mimicker-in-the-Browser: A Novel Interaction Using Mimicry to Augment the Browsing Experience

Abstract

Humans are known to have a better subconscious impression of other humans when their movements are imitated in social interactions. Despite this influential phenomenon, its application in human-computer interaction is currently limited to specific areas, such as an agent mimicking the head movements of a user in virtual reality, because capturing user movements conventionally requires external sensors. If we can implement the mimicry effect in a scalable platform without such sensors, a new approach for designing human-computer interaction will be introduced. Therefore, we have investigated whether users feel positively toward a mimicking agent that is delivered by a standalone web application using only a webcam. We also examined whether a web page that changes its background pattern based on head movements can foster a favorable impression. The positive effect confirmed in our experiments supports mimicry as a novel design practice to augment our daily browsing experiences.