The World Wide Wait: Exploring Physiological and Behavioral Effects of Download Speed

ABSTRACT

When people use humorous media content, their behavior and assessments of the content may depend on the emotional expressions (e.g., laughter) of those around them. In a laboratory experiment in which 80 participants watched a movie clip with a confederate who either laughed or remained silent, we identified two parallel processes. The confederate’s laughter induced behavioral responses in our participants (laughing or smiling). Through those responses, a corresponding appraisal of the media content was generated: The content was rated funnier in comparison to situations in which the confederate did not laugh. This effect corresponds to emotional contagion processes and was especially pronounced in introverts. Additionally, participants who were low in conscientiousness directly elevated their funniness ratings (more than their own emotional expressions would suggest) when the confederate laughed. Those who were high in conscientiousness, however, lowered their ratings of the content’s funniness in the presence of a laughing confederate. This finding suggests the existence of an additional cognitive process that links confederate’s laughter and participant’s content ratings beyond automatic contagion. Participants with low conscientiousness use the confederate’s laughter as a heuristic cue for the content’s funniness, while highly conscientious participants discount the confederate’s laughter as a cue for content funniness.     

Knowing me,knowing you: emotion differentiation in oneself is associated with recognition of others’ emotions

ABSTRACT

Previous research has found that individuals vary greatly in emotion differentiation, that is, the extent to which they distinguish between different emotions when reporting on their own feelings. Building on previous work that has shown that emotion differentiation is associated with individual differences in intrapersonal functions, the current study asks whether emotion differentiation is also related to interpersonal skills. Specifically, we examined whether individuals who are high in emotion differentiation would be more accurate in recognising others’ emotional expressions. We report two studies in which we used an established paradigm tapping negative emotion differentiation and several emotion recognition tasks. In Study 1 (N?=?363), we found that individuals high in emotion differentiation were more accurate in recognising others’ emotional facial expressions. Study 2 (N?=?217), replicated this finding using emotion recognition tasks with varying amounts of emotional information. These findings suggest that the knowledge we use to understand our own emotional experience also helps us understand the emotions of others.     

The differential contribution of facial expressions,prosody, and speech content to empathy

Background: Facial expressions, prosody, and speech content constitute channels by which information is exchanged. Little is known about the simultaneous and differential contribution of these channels to empathy when they provide emotionality or neutrality. Especially neutralised speech content has gained little attention with regards to influencing the perception of other emotional cues. Methods: Participants were presented with video clips of actors telling short-stories. One condition conveyed emotionality in all channels while the other conditions either provided neutral speech content, facial expression, or prosody, respectively. Participants judged the emotion and intensity presented, as well as their own emotional state and intensity. Skin conductance served as a physiological measure of emotional reactivity. Results: Neutralising channels significantly reduced empathic responses. Electrodermal recordings confirmed these findings. The differential effect of the communication channels on empathy prerequisites was that target emotion recognition of the other decreased mostly when the face was neutral, whereas decreased emotional responses attributed to the target emotion were especially present in neutral speech. Conclusion: Multichannel integration supports conscious and autonomous measures of empathy and emotional reactivity. Emotional facial expressions influence emotion recognition, whereas speech content is important for responding with an adequate own emotional state, possibly reflecting contextual emotion-appraisal.     

Emotion processing in children who do and do not stutter: An ERP study of electrocortical reactivity and regulation to peer facial expressions

PurposeEvent-related brain potentials (ERPs) were used to investigate the neural correlates of emotion processing in 5- to 8-year-old children who do and do not stutter.MethodsParticipants were presented with an audio contextual cue followed by images of threatening (angry/fearful) and neutral facial expressions from similarly aged peers. Three conditions differed in audio-image pairing: neutral context-neutral expression (neutral condition), negative context-threatening expression (threat condition), and reappraisal context-threatening expression (reappraisal condition). These conditions reflected social stimuli that are ecologically valid to the everyday life of children.ResultsP100, N170, and late positive potential (LPP) ERP components were elicited over parietal and occipital electrodes. The threat condition elicited an increased LPP mean amplitude compared to the neutral condition across our participants, suggesting increased emotional reactivity to threatening facial expressions. In addition, LPP amplitude decreased during the reappraisal condition— evidence of emotion regulation. No group differences were observed in the mean amplitude of ERP components between children who do and do not stutter. Furthermore, dimensions of childhood temperament and stuttering severity were not strongly correlated with LPP elicitation.ConclusionThese findings are suggestive that, at this young age, children who stutter exhibit typical brain activation underlying emotional reactivity and regulation to social threat from peer facial expressions.     

Emotional responsiveness and obsessive-compulsive behaviour

Abstract

Several clinicians have proposed that patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) are unusually sensitive to unpleasant events. We tested a non-clinical sample of obsessive-compulsive (O-C) subjects who reported in diagnostic interviews that they experienced significant problems with obsessions and/or compulsions. Excerpts from three emotion-eliciting films were shown to 10 O-C males, 12 O-C females, 12 normal males, and 12 normal females. Emotional response was measured by using a self-report instrument and by recording facial expressions, which were coded for both appropriate emotional reactions as well as reactions that may represent efforts to mask or control the display of negative emotion. The groups did not differ with regard to subjective response to the film clips, but facial responses indicated that O-C subjects made more efforts to suppress the expression of fear (inappropriate smiles/laughs) during the frightening film clip. In spite of these responses, male O-C subjects also tended to reveal more frightened facial expressions than male control subjects. This finding is believed to illustrate one component of a model in which exaggerated emotional response is a precursor to the development of OCD.     

The Effects of Apology and Perspective Taking on Interpersonal Forgiveness: A Dissonance-Attribution Model of Interpersonal Forgiveness

Abstract

The author investigated (a) the effects of a victim's perspective taking and a transgressor's apology on interpersonal forgiveness and (b) forgiveness as a mode of dissonance reduction. Before the participants read a scenario describing a situation in which they imagined being mistreated by a classmate, the author randomly assigned them to 1 of 4 perspective-taking conditions: (a) recalling times when they had mistreated or hurt others (i.e., the recall-self-as-transgressor condition); (b) imagining how they would think, feel, and behave if they were the classmate (i.e., the imagine-self condition); (c) imagining how the classmate would think, feel, and behave (i.e., the imagine-other condition); or (d) imagining the situation from their own (i.e., the victim's/control) perspective. After reading the scenario, the participants read an apology from the classmate. The participants in the recall-self-as-transgressor condition were significantly more likely than those in the control condition to (a) make benevolent attributions, (b) experience benevolent emotional reactions, and (c) forgive the transgressor. The relationship between the perspective-taking manipulation and forgiveness was mediated by the benevolent attributions and positive emotional reactions experienced by the victims.     

Psychophysiological effects of emotional dissonance in a face-to-face service interaction

Abstract

Current research demonstrates that requirements to express emotions which are not genuinely felt in the particular situation (emotional dissonance) are associated with negative long and short-term effects. The aim of the present study was to investigate: (a) the psychophysiological short-term effects of emotional dissonance in a face-to-face service interaction and (b) the moderating role of gender and neuroticism. In total, 32 women and 27 men were instructed to play the role of a service employee, who had to interact with an angry and rude customer. Half of the sample was given information that the organization expected them to be friendly (emotional dissonance), the other half was told they were expected to act naturally and show their genuine feelings (no emotional dissonance). Subjective and behavioral responses revealed that participants in the “friendly” condition modulated their emotional expressions to a greater extent than those in the “naturally” condition. Participants in the “friendly” condition showed stronger systolic and diastolic blood pressure responses. Furthermore, hierarchical regression analyses yielded that gender and neuroticism partly moderated the association between emotional dissonance and participants' psychophysiological response.     

Coordination of Emotions in Mother–Infant Dialogues

Eleven infant–mother dyads in Crete were videod during spontaneous interactions at home, from the second to the sixth month of life. Micro‐analysis was used to investigate‘coordination'and ‘non‐matching’ of facial expressions of emotion. ‘Emotional coordination’ was evaluated with four measures: matching of facial expressions, completion when one responded to the other with ‘pleasure’ or ‘interest’, synchrony by matching frequency of change or rhythm of emotional expressions, and attunement when shifts of emotional intensity of the two partners were in the same direction.‘Emotional non‐matching'was coded when neither the infant nor the mother showed interest in interacting with the other. In emotional coordination or non‐matching between mother and infant, who performed first was also recorded. We obtained evidence of emotional matching, synchrony, and attunement. Importantly, the probability of emotional non‐matching by the infant was higher than the probability of emotional matching and completion, indicating a tendency for thoughtful attention or playful rivalry in the responses of infants, who also initiated emotional matching, completion, and non‐matching more frequently than mothers. The probability of expression of emotional matching, completion, and non‐matching changed with age. Both mothers and infants act to obtain sympathetic complementarity of feelings and co‐operative inter‐synchrony of actions. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Young adults’ reactions to infant crying

AimTo determine whether young childless adults show negative emotions and cognitive disturbances when listening to infant crying, compared to other disturbing noises, and whether negative emotions and cognitive disturbances are associated.MethodsWe tested the cognitive performances and emotional reactions of 120 childless participants on a working memory task while being subjected to different disturbing noises including infant crying.ResultsParticipants had the least correct trials on the working memory task, and showed the most negative emotions, when hearing infant crying as compared to the other noises. Participants also showed less positive emotions when hearing infant crying as compared to working in silence. Overall, negative emotions were associated with less correct trials on the working memory task, except in the infant crying condition. Furthermore, cognitive performance and emotional reactions to infant crying were unrelated to personality characteristics.ConclusionNegative emotions and cognitive disturbances may be general adult responses to infant crying that are not limited to parents. These results suggest a broadly present human emotional and cognitive response to infant crying, that may underlie a general predisposition to care for infants in distress.     

Preschool girls' distress and mothers' sensitivity in Japan and Germany

Cultures differ in their beliefs about emotions and related emotional expressions. Cultures with an interdependent model of self prefer more socially engaged emotions, and cultures with an independent model of self perceive socially disengaged emotions as more important. Such differences in individual emotional expression can be seen as outcomes of different socialization practices in children's development of emotions. Mothers' sensitivity was assumed to promote culturally valued ways of children's emotional expressions. The present cross-cultural study aimed to test distress reactions of young children in Japan and Germany in self-focused and other-focused conditions. German and Japanese preschool girls (N = 50) were observed in two distress conditions. Distress was evoked by the child's own failure (self-focused distress) and by the experience of another person's distress (other-focused distress). The mothers were present in the failure condition. The girls' intensity of distress expression was coded before and directly after the emotion-eliciting event (immediate expression) as well as at the end of each situation (change of expression over time). Mothers' sensitivity was coded during the failure condition. No cultural differences occurred for girls' intensity of immediate distress expression but for the change of expression over time in both situations in the expected culture-specific way. Furthermore, maternal sensitivity was also related to the daughter's change of distress expressions in a culture-specific way. These results point to effects of universal and culture-specific emotion socialization.     

The bidirectional relation of emotion perception and social judgments: the effect of witness’ emotion expression on perceptions of moral behaviour and vice versa

The present research tested the notion that emotion expression and context perception are bidirectionally related. Specifically, in two studies focusing on moral violations (N?=?288) and positive moral deviations (N?=?245) respectively, we presented participants with short vignettes describing behaviours that were either (im)moral, (in)polite or unusual together with a picture of the emotional reaction of a person who supposedly had been a witness to the event. Participants rated both the emotional reactions observed and their own moral appraisal of the situation described. In both studies, we found that situational context influenced how emotional reactions to this context were rated and in turn, the emotional expression shown in reaction to a situation influenced the appraisal of the situation. That is, neither the moral events nor the emotion expressions were judged in an absolute fashion. Rather, the perception of one also depended on the other.     

The recognition and categorization of upright and inverted emotional expressions by 7-month-old infants

Upright and inverted faces were used to determine whether 7-month-old infants discriminate emotional expressions on the basis of affectively relevant information. In Experiment 1, infants recognized the similarity of happy faces over changing identities and discriminated this expression from fear and anger when the stimuli were presented upright, but not when they were inverted. In Experiment 2, infants were able to discriminate happiness from fear and anger posed by a single model, regardless of the orientation of the stimuli. From these studies it was suggested that categorizing emotional expressions depends upon attending to affectively relevant, orientation-specific information, whereas the discrimination of emotional expressions can be done on a featural basis, something that remains invariant regardless of the orientation of the stimuli. In Experiment 3, infants discriminated toothy happiness posed by several models from nontoothy happiness and nontoothy anger when the stimuli were presented upright and inverted. Thus, when salient features were available, the infants based their discriminations on perceptual aspects rather than on conceptual aspects such as categories of emotions.     

No Doubt About It: When Doubtful Role Models Undermine Men's and Women's Math Performance Under Threat

ABSTRACT

Past work has shown that female role models are effective buffers against stereotype threat. The present research examines the boundary conditions of this role model effect. Specifically, we argue that female role models should avoid expressing doubt about their math abilities; otherwise they may cease to buffer women from stereotype threat. For men, a non-doubtful male role model should be seen as threatening, thus harming performance. A doubtful male role model, however, should be seen as non-threatening, thus allowing men to perform up to their ability in math. To test this reasoning, men and women were exposed to either an outgroup or ingroup role model who either expressed doubt or did not. Participants then took a math exam under stereotype threat conditions. As expected, doubtful ingroup role models hurt women, but helped men's performance. Outgroup role models' expressed doubt had no differential effect on performance. We also show that expressions of doubt take on a different meaning when expressed by a female rather than a male role model.     

Emergence of temperament in the neonate: neonates who cry longer during their first bath still cry longer at their next bathings

We observed that neonates who cried during bathing on day 2 still cried on days 3 and 4. The correlation coefficient, for example, between day 2 and day 3 was r = 0.410, p < 0.001, n = 100. Neonates may already have a distinct temperament (withdrawal and adaptability) as early as day 2 after birth.     

The effect of another bystander's ability to help on bystander intervention in an emergency

Previous research in bystander intervention found that the presence of other bystanders reduced the speed of reporting an emergency. The present research tested the hypothesis that it is not the mere presence of others that reduces speed of helping, but how the others are perceived. Specifically, if another bystander is seen as not being able to help, then there should be no effect on the speed with which the S helps. Subjects who thought they were in an ESP experiment overheard what seemed to be an emergency. A “victim” cried out that a bookcase was falling on her; this was followed by a scream and a loud crash. There was no difference in helping behavior between the condition in which there were no other bystanders present and the condition in which the other bystander could not help. However, as predicted, Ss in both of these conditions helped significantly sooner than Ss in the condition in which the other bystander was perceived as being able to help.     

Deviant Workplace Behavior as Emotional Action: Discriminant and Interactive Roles for Work-Related Emotional Intelligence

ABSTRACT

Employees are thought to engage in deviant workplace behaviors (e.g., sabotage, theft) when they are stressed, frustrated, or angry. Given the emotional nature of these actions, individual differences in work-related emotional intelligence (W-EI) should, potentially, be consequential. Three studies (ns = 91, 198, & 147) examined this possibility by assessing variations in emotion perception and management skills with an ability measure specifically designed for the workplace context. Employees who received higher W-EI scores were less prone to both interpersonal deviance and organizational deviance and these relationships displayed discriminant validity as well as meaningful interactive effects with organizational stressors. The investigation extends our understanding of workplace deviance in a way that highlights an important role for work-related variations in emotional intelligence.     

Wheel chairs and arm chairs: A novel experimental design for the emotional Stroop effect

The emotional Stroop effect demonstrates that people are slower to name the ink colour of emotionally charged words than that of neutral words. Attributing this slowdown to emotionality or threat requires that the emotion and neutral words presented are equal on all extraneous variables. However, it is impossible in principle to match the two types of words on all conceivable variables. To address the problem, we presented the same set of words, polarised to be negative in one condition and neutral in another by using appropriate prime words that produced the desired valence through idiomatic two-word expressions. Across two studies, participants took longer to name the colour of the same words when they were rendered negative than when they were rendered neutral. This difference reflects a true emotional Stroop effect given the control provided for all potentially confounding variables tied to the target stimuli. The new procedure also enables researchers to calculate item-specific emotional Stroop effects for the first time.     

Understanding associations between negatively biased attention and depression and social anxiety: positively biased attention is key

ABSTRACT

Background and objectives: Although research supports the premise that depressed and socially anxious individuals direct attention preferentially toward negative emotional cues, little is known about how attention to positive emotional cues might modulate this negative attention bias risk process. The purpose of this study was to determine if associations between attention biases to sad and angry faces and depression and social anxiety symptoms, respectively, would be strongest in individuals who also show biased attention away from happy faces.

Methods: Young adults (N?=?151; 79% female; M?=?19.63 years) completed self-report measures of depression and social anxiety symptoms and a dot probe task to assess attention biases to happy, sad, and angry facial expressions.

Results: Attention bias to happy faces moderated associations between attention to negatively valenced faces and psychopathology symptoms. However, attention bias toward sad faces was positively and significantly related to depression symptoms only for individuals who also selectively attended toward happy faces. Similarly, attention bias toward angry faces was positively and significantly associated with social anxiety symptoms only for individuals who also selectively attended toward happy faces.

Conclusions: These findings suggest that individuals with high levels of depression or social anxiety symptoms attend preferentially to emotional stimuli across valences.     

Adjustment modes in the trajectory of progressive multiple sclerosis: a qualitative study and conceptual model

Objective: We examined cognitive and behavioural challenges and adaptations for people with progressive multiple sclerosis (MS) and developed a preliminary conceptual model of changes in adjustment over time.

Design: Using theoretical sampling, 34 semi-structured interviews were conducted with people with MS. Participants were between 41 and 77 years of age. Thirteen were diagnosed with primary progressive MS and 21 with secondary progressive MS. Data were analysed using a grounded theory approach.

Results: Participants described initially bracketing the illness off and carrying on their usual activities but this became problematic as the condition progressed and they employed different adjustment modes to cope with increased disabilities. Some scaled back their activities to live a more comfortable life, others identified new activities or adapted old ones, whereas at times, people disengaged from the adjustment process altogether and resigned to their condition. Relationships with partners, emotional reactions, environment and perception of the environment influenced adjustment, while people were often flexible and shifted among modes.

Conclusions: Adjusting to a progressive condition is a fluid process. Future interventions can be tailored to address modifiable factors at different stages of the condition and may involve addressing emotional reactions concealing/revealing the condition and perceptions of the environment.