Apparatus, method and program for supporting conversation, and conversation supporting system

A conversation supporting method for supporting face-to-face conversation among a plurality of participants in an occasion in which the participants participate, comprising:

• detecting presence of a participant;
• identifying the detected participant;
• retrieving personal information on the identified participant;
• extracting a predetermined characteristic value from the retrieved personal information;
• and
• outputting, based on a color predetermined for each attribution of the characteristic value, the characteristic value extracted from the personal information of the plurality of the participants as an average color corresponding to a number of participants each having a specific attribution of the characteristic value, and displaying the extracted characteristic value to the plurality of participants to encourage direct face-to-face conversation in the presence of the plurality of participants.

A conversation supporting program for supporting face-to-face-conversation among participants in an occasion in which multiple participants participate, the program comprising:

• a person identifying step of identifying a participant detected by a detecting unit that detects presence of the participant;
• a personal information retrieving step of retrieving personal information on the participant identified by the person identifying step from a personal information storing unit that stores personal information including at least one characteristic value representing a characteristic of the participant;
• a characteristic value extracting step of extracting a predetermined characteristic value from the personal information retrieved by the personal information retrieving step;
• and
• a characteristic value outputting step of outputting, based on a color predetermined for each attribution of the characteristic value, the characteristic value extracted from the personal information of the plurality of the participants by the characteristic value extracting step as an average color corresponding to a number of participants each having a specific attribution of the characteristic value and displaying the characteristic value to the plurality of participants to encourage direct face-to-face conversation in the presence of the plurality of participants.

A conversation supporting system for supporting face-to-face conversation among participants in an occasion in which multiple participants participate, comprising:

• a first apparatus including a person identifying unit that detects presence of a participant, and identifying the detected participant;
• a second apparatus including a personal information storing unit that stores personal information including at least one characteristic value representing a characteristic of a participant, a personal information retrieving unit that retrieves personal information of the participant identified by the person identifying unit from the personal information storing unit, and a characteristic value extracting unit that extracts a predetermined characteristic value from the personal information retrieved by the personal information retrieving unit;
• and
• a third apparatus including a characteristic value outputting unit that outputs, based on a color predetermined for each attribution of the characteristic value, the characteristic value extracted from the personal information of the plurality of the participants by the characteristic value extracting unit as an average color corresponding to a number of participants each having a specific attribution of the characteristic value and displays the characteristic value to the plurality of participants to encourage direct face-to-face conversation in the presence of the plurality of participants,
• wherein the first apparatus, the second apparatus and the third apparatus are connected to each other through a network that enables face-to-face conversation.