Eye Tracking Used To Determine Personality Traits In New Study

New research proves that eyes might in fact be windows to the soul. Over the past few years, eye tracking technology has emerged as a field of much academic and corporate interest. With major acquisitions by Apple (SMI) and Oculus (The Eye Tribe), it's clear that major international companies regard eye tracking technology as an vital facet of Industry 4.0 -- particularly in its integration with virtual and augmented reality technologies (VR/AR), which involve persistent interaction with the human eye. In the study, researchers tracked 42 participants' eye movements while going about their day on a university campus, and matrixed these findings against user questionnaires. The results assert that machine learning can in fact deduce important personality traits with appropriate datasets -- with the algorithm reliably identifying four of the "Big Five" human personality traits: agreeableness, conscientiousness, extroversion, and neuroticism. In a statement from UniSA, Senior Lecturer of Psychology Dr. Tobias Loetscher explained that this research establishes a meaningful link between our eye motions and our innate and learned characteristics: People are always looking for improved, personalised [sic] services.