Social Agent: Mastering Dyadic Nonverbal Behavior Generation via Conversational LLM Agents
On the map: LLM agents and tool use → Multimodal and embodied agents
Abstract (arXiv)
We present Social Agent, a novel framework for synthesizing realistic and contextually appropriate co-speech nonverbal behaviors in dyadic conversations. In this framework, we develop an agentic system driven by a Large Language Model (LLM) to direct the conversation flow and determine appropriate interactive behaviors for both participants. Additionally, we propose a novel dual-person gesture generation model based on an auto-regressive diffusion model, which synthesizes coordinated motions from speech signals. The output of the agentic system is translated into high-level guidance for the gesture generator, resulting in realistic movement at both the behavioral and motion levels. Furthermore, the agentic system periodically examines the movements of interlocutors and infers their intentions, forming a continuous feedback loop that enables dynamic and responsive interactions between the two participants. User studies and quantitative evaluations show that our model significantly improves the quality of dyadic interactions, producing natural, synchronized nonverbal behaviors.
Key facts. Cited by 8 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026). Placed in Multimodal and embodied agents, one of 16 directions in LLM agents and tool use. Builds on 45 of its 77 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 6 Oct 2025.
Builds on
45 of 77 references.
Closest ancestors · 1
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Other references · 44
- 2020Denoising Diffusion Probabilistic Modelscited by 21,076
- 2020Denoising Diffusion Implicit Modelscited by 9,781
- 2015Deep Unsupervised Learning using Nonequilibrium Thermodynamicscited by 7,058
- 2022Robust Speech Recognition via Large-Scale Weak Supervisioncited by 4,057
- 2021WavLM: Large-Scale Self-Supervised Pre-Training for Full Stack Speech Processingcited by 1,657
- 2021AI Choreographer: Music Conditioned 3D Dance Generation with AIST++cited by 485
- 2023Human Motion Diffusion as a Generative Priorcited by 357
- 2022EDGE: Editable Dance Generation From Musiccited by 287
- 2023OmniControl: Control Any Joint at Any Time for Human Motion Generationcited by 238
- 2023Guided Motion Diffusion for Controllable Human Motion Synthesiscited by 223
- 2020Speech Gesture Generation from the Trimodal Context of Text, Audio, and Speaker Identitycited by 202
- 2022Listen, Denoise, Action! Audio-Driven Motion Synthesis with Diffusion Modelscited by 190
32 more
- 2022BEAT: A Large-Scale Semantic and Emotional Multi-Modal Dataset for Conversational Gestures Synthesiscited by 178
- 2023GestureDiffuCLIP: Gesture Diffusion Model with CLIP Latentscited by 158
- 2022Learning to Listen: Modeling Non-Deterministic Dyadic Facial Motioncited by 126
- 2021Audio2Gestures: Generating Diverse Gestures from Speech Audio with Conditional Variational Autoencoderscited by 109
- 2021Learning Speech-driven 3D Conversational Gestures from Videocited by 98
- 2023Wider and Deeper LLM Networks are Fairer LLM Evaluatorscited by 94
- 2023DiffuseStyleGesture: Stylized Audio-Driven Co-Speech Gesture Generation with Diffusion Modelscited by 85
- 2020Gesticulator: A framework for semantically-aware speech-driven gesture generationcited by 84
- 2022ZeroEGGS: Zero-shot Example-based Gesture Generation from Speechcited by 84
- 2024From Audio to Photoreal Embodiment: Synthesizing Humans in Conversationscited by 82
- 2023A Comprehensive Review of Data-Driven Co-Speech Gesture Generationcited by 66
- 2024DiffSHEG: A Diffusion-Based Approach for Real-Time Speech-driven Holistic 3D Expression and Gesture Generationcited by 62
- 2021Speech2AffectiveGestures: Synthesizing Co-Speech Gestures with Generative Adversarial Affective Expression Learningcited by 58
- 2023EmotionGesture: Audio-Driven Diverse Emotional Co-Speech 3D Gesture Generationcited by 40
- 2023Can Language Models Learn to Listen?cited by 40
- 2024Semantic Gesticulator: Semantics-Aware Co-Speech Gesture Synthesiscited by 40
- 2022Rhythmic Gesticulator: Rhythm-Aware Co-Speech Gesture Synthesis with Hierarchical Neural Embeddingscited by 38
- 2024TANGO: Co-Speech Gesture Video Reenactment with Hierarchical Audio Motion Embedding and Diffusion Interpolationcited by 32
- 2023Evaluating gesture generation in a large-scale open challenge: The GENEA Challenge 2022cited by 29
- 2023The GENEA Challenge 2023: A large scale evaluation of gesture generation models in monadic and dyadic settingscited by 28
- 2023DiffMotion: Speech-Driven Gesture Synthesis Using Denoising Diffusion Modelcited by 22
- 2023BodyFormer: Semantics-guided 3D Body Gesture Synthesis with Transformercited by 21
- 2024Programmable Motion Generation for Open-Set Motion Control Taskscited by 20
- 2024CoMA: Compositional Human Motion Generation with Multi-modal Agentscited by 19
- 2024Freetalker: Controllable Speech and Text-Driven Gesture Generation Based on Diffusion Models for Enhanced Speaker Naturalnesscited by 18
- 2024SIGGesture: Generalized Co-Speech Gesture Synthesis via Semantic Injection with Large-Scale Pre-Training Diffusion Modelscited by 18
- 2024Beyond Talking -- Generating Holistic 3D Human Dyadic Motion for Communicationcited by 14
- 2021Speech2Properties2Gestures: Gesture-Property Prediction as a Tool for Generating Representational Gestures from Speechcited by 12
- 2025Co3Gesture: Towards Coherent Concurrent Co-speech 3D Gesture Generation with Interactive Diffusioncited by 9
- 2024InterAct: Capture and Modelling of Realistic, Expressive and Interactive Activities between Two Persons in Daily Scenarioscited by 7
- 2025Large Language Models for Virtual Human Gesture Selectioncited by 4
- 2024It Takes Two: Real-time Co-Speech Two-person's Interaction Generation via Reactive Auto-regressive Diffusion Modelcited by 2
Built on by
Citing papers per year: 2025: 1; 2026: 7.
8 papers.
- 2026LLaMo: Scaling Pretrained Language Models for Unified Motion Understanding and Generation with Continuous Autoregressive Tokenscited by 11
- 2025ViBES: A Conversational Agent with Behaviorally-Intelligent 3D Virtual Bodycited by 6
- 2026ProAct: Harnessing Streaming Motion Generation and Agentic Reasoning for Real-Time Embodied Social Interactioncited by 3
- 2026U-Mind: A Unified Framework for Real-Time Multimodal Interaction with Audiovisual Generationcited by 2
- 2026Weak-Link Optimization for Multi-Agent Reasoning and Collaborationcited by 1
- 2026Towards Trust Calibration in Socially Interactive Agents: Investigating Gendered Multimodal Behaviors Generation with LLMscited by 0
- 2026SalsaAgent: A multimodal embodied language model for interactive dance generationcited by 0
- 2026MindFlow: Harmonizing Cognitive Semantics and Acoustic Dynamics for Facial Animation Generation in Dyadic Conversationscited by 0
- 2026MindFlow: Harmonizing Cognitive Semantics and Acoustic Dynamics for Facial Animation Generation in Dyadic Conversations26 Jun 2026
- 2026SalsaAgent: A multimodal embodied language model for interactive dance generation28 May 2026
- 2026Towards Trust Calibration in Socially Interactive Agents: Investigating Gendered Multimodal Behaviors Generation with LLMs19 May 2026
- 2026Weak-Link Optimization for Multi-Agent Reasoning and Collaboration17 Apr 2026
- 2026U-Mind: A Unified Framework for Real-Time Multimodal Interaction with Audiovisual Generation27 Feb 2026
- 2026ProAct: Harnessing Streaming Motion Generation and Agentic Reasoning for Real-Time Embodied Social Interaction15 Feb 2026
- 2026LLaMo: Scaling Pretrained Language Models for Unified Motion Understanding and Generation with Continuous Autoregressive Tokens12 Feb 2026
- 2025ViBES: A Conversational Agent with Behaviorally-Intelligent 3D Virtual Body16 Dec 2025
Similar, not cited
Close in wording, no citation either way
- 2026DyaDiT: A Multi-Modal Diffusion Transformer for Socially Favorable Dyadic Gesture Generation
- 2025Latent Behavior Diffusion for Sequential Reaction Generation in Dyadic Setting
- 2023Affective Faces for Goal-Driven Dyadic Communication
- 2026Generating Natural and Expressive Robot Gestures through Iterative Reinforcement Learning with Human Feedback using LLMs
- 2025Learning to Generate Pointing Gestures in Situated Embodied Conversational Agents
- 2026Super Star: Towards Streaming Real-time Interactive Agents for Digital Humans
- 2024Generative Expressive Robot Behaviors using Large Language Models
- 2026Agent Sociodrama: Social-Dynamics-Guided Persona Recasting for LLM Agent Teams