The context sensitivity of visual size perception varies across cultures

There is evidence that East Asian cultures have more context-sensitive styles of reasoning, memory, attention, and scene perception than Western cultures. Lower levels of the perceptual hierarchy seem likely to be similar in all cultures, however, so we compared context sensitivity in Japan with that in the UK using a rigorous psychophysical measure of the effects of centre-surround contrast on size discrimination. In both cultures context sensitivity was greater for females working in the social sciences than for males working in the mathematical sciences. More surprisingly, context sensitivity was also much greater in Japan than in the UK. These findings show that, even at low levels of the visual-processing hierarchy, context sensitivity varies across cultures, and they raise important issues for both vision scientists and cross-cultural psychologists.     

Carol Gilligan's theory of sex differences in the development of moral reasoning during adolescence

Gilligan's work, which focuses on sex differences in moral reasoning, the perception of violence, the resolution of sexual dilemmas and abortion decisions, poses a major challenge to Kohlberg's theory by introducing a feminist perspective of moral development. Kohlberg had shown that the average female attained a moral judgment rating of stage three (good boy-nice girl), while adolescent males score at level four (law and order) and are more likely to move on to postconventional levels. Gilligan suggests that these findings reveal a gender bias, not that females are less mature than boys. Men and women follow different voices. Men tend to organize social relationships in a hierarchical order and subscribe to a morality of rights. Females value interpersonal connectedness, care, sensitivity, and responsibility to people. Kohlberg's scoring criteria give the interpersonal care orientations of females lower ratings than the principled justice orientation. Hence, Gilligan identifies different developmental stages for females. However, she does not claim that one system is better; both are equally valid. Only by integrating these complementary male (justice) and female (care) orientations will we be able to realize our full human potential in moral development.     

A Role for the X Chromosome in Sex Differences in Variability in General Intelligence?

ABSTRACT— There is substantial evidence that males are more variable than females in general intelligence. In recent years, researchers have presented this as a reason that, although there is little, if any, mean sex difference in general intelligence, males tend to be overrepresented at both ends of its overall distribution. Part of the explanation could be the presence of genes on the X chromosome related both to syndromal disorders involving mental retardation and to population variation in general intelligence occurring normally. Genes on the X chromosome appear overrepresented among genes with known involvement in mental retardation, which is consistent with a model we developed of the population distribution of general intelligence as a mixture of two normal distributions. Using this model, we explored the expected ratios of males to females at various points in the distribution and estimated the proportion of variance in general intelligence potentially due to genes on the X chromosome. These estimates provide clues to the extent to which biologically based sex differences could be manifested in the environment as sex differences in displayed intellectual abilities. We discuss these observations in the context of sex differences in specific cognitive abilities and evolutionary theories of sexual selection.     

Mood-congruent biases in facial emotion perception and their gender dependence

Due to mood-congruency effects, we expect the emotion perceived on a face to be biased towards one's own mood. But the findings in the scant literature on such mood effects in normal healthy populations have not consistently and adequately supported this expectation. Employing effective mood manipulation techniques that ensured that the intended mood was sustained throughout the perception task, we explored mood-congruent intensity and recognition accuracy biases in emotion perception. Using realistic face stimuli with expressive cues of happiness and sadness, we demonstrated that happy, neutral and ambiguous expressions were perceived more positively in the positive than in the negative mood. The mood-congruency effect decreased with the degree of perceived negativity in the expression. Also, males were more affected by the mood-congruency effect in intensity perception than females. We suggest that the greater salience and better processing of negative stimuli and the superior cognitive ability of females in emotion perception are responsible for these observations. We found no evidence for mood-congruency effect in the recognition accuracy of emotions and suggest with supporting evidence that past reports of this effect may be attributed to response bias driven by mood.     

Boys don't cry: Cognitive load and priming increase stereotypic sex differences in emotion memory

The results of three experiments provide evidence that the relative accessibility of stereotypes about sex difference influences people's memory of very recent emotions. Being under high rather than low cognitive load caused females compared with males to recall experiencing more intense emotional reactions to saddening stimuli (Experiments 1 and 2), and relatively less intense reactions to angering stimuli (Experiment 2). Being directly primed with stereotypes about sex differences and being under high cognitive load both caused females to recall more intense reactions to saddening stimuli compared with females who were neither primed with stereotypes nor under cognitive load (Experiment 3). These results imply that the relative accessibility of stereotypes influences memories of emotion in a manner similar to stereotypes' influence on social perception. Implications of these findings for theories of emotion memory and for self-perpetuating stereotypes about emotional sex differences are discussed.     

Hostility‐ and gender‐related differences in oscillatory responses to emotional facial expressions

Hostility is associated with biases in the perception of emotional facial expressions, such that ambiguous or neutral expressions tend to be perceived as threatening or angry. In this study, the effects of hostility and gender on the perception of angry, neutral, and happy faces and on the oscillatory dynamics of cortical responses elicited by these presentations were investigated using time–frequency decomposition by means of wavelet transforms. Feelings of hostility predisposed subjects to perceive happy and neutral faces as less friendly. This effect was more pronounced in women. In hostile subjects, presentation of emotional facial expressions also evoked stronger posterior synchronization in the theta and diminished desynchronization in the alpha band. This may signify a prevalence of emotional responding over cognitive processing. These effects were also more pronounced in females. Hostile females, but not hostile males, additionally showed a widespread synchronization in the alpha band. This synchronization is tentatively explained as a manifestation of inhibitory control which is present in aggressive females, but not in aggressive males. Aggr. Behav. 35:502–513, 2009. © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Transient sex differences during adolescence on auditory perceptual tasks

Many perceptual abilities differ between the sexes. Because these sex differences have been documented almost exclusively in adults, they have been attributed to sex‐specific neural circuitry that emerges during development and is maintained in the mature perceptual system. To investigate whether behavioral sex differences in perception can also have other origins, we compared performance between males and females ranging in age from 8 to 30 years on auditory temporal‐interval discrimination and tone‐in‐noise detection tasks on which there are no sex differences in adults. If sex differences in perception arise only from the establishment and subsequent maintenance of sex‐specific neural circuitry, there should be no sex differences during development on these tasks. In contrast, sex differences emerged in adolescence but resolved by adulthood on two of the six conditions, with signs of a similar pattern on a third condition. In each case, males reached mature performance earlier than females, resulting in a sex difference in the interim. These results suggest that sex differences in perception may arise from differences in the maturational timing of common circuitry used by both sexes. They also imply that sex differences in perceptual abilities may be more prevalent than previously thought based on adult data alone.     

Sex differences in processing aggression words using the Emotional Stroop task

There is a robust relationship between the salience of stimulus materials presented in the Emotional Stroop task and inhibition of response in clinical populations. Researchers have now found information‐processing biases in both forensic and non‐forensic samples presented with threatening or aggressive stimuli [Cohen et'al., 1998; Eckhardt and Cohen, 1997; Smith and Waterman, 2003; Van Honk et'al., 2001]. We sought to explore sex differences in processing words relating to acts of direct and indirect aggression using a group of undergraduates (50 males and 50 females). Participants also completed self‐report questionnaires (AQ and EXPAGG) to allow some consideration of the relationship between objective and subjective measures. We predicted that males would demonstrate delayed responses when presented with words relating to acts of direct aggression. We also predicted that high levels of physical aggression would be the best predictor of bias for direct aggression words, high levels of verbal aggression would be the best predictor of bias for indirect aggression words, physical aggression would predict bias in males, and verbal aggression would predict bias in females. Males demonstrated a perceptual bias for words relating to acts of direct aggression, taking significantly longer to correctly colour name direct aggression words. Females were slower to correctly colour name indirect aggression words, but not significantly so. Verbal aggression, as expected, predicted bias performance for indirect aggression words but anger rather than physical aggression was the best predictor of bias for direct aggression words. Gender was a predictor for bias with both sets of words. Contrary to our predictions, it was observed that a high level of physical aggression was the best predictor of bias in both males and females. These data provide further evidence to confirm the saliency of aggression words to aggressive individuals in non‐forensic populations. Aggress. Behav. 00:00–00, 2005. © 2005 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Spatial configurations: Erikson reexamined

In a 1951 study, Erik Erikson reported differences in preadolescents' play constructions. He claimed that his findings reflected differences between males and females in their experience and perception of space. The present study replicated but also expanded the original design. In order to control for possible sex bias of materials, a constructed scene using only blocks was added to Erikson's original design. The results failed to replicate Erikson's findings. In fact, in the construction of scenes from blocks, more females than males built erected structures; this was true across all ages. These findings are in direct contrast to Erikson's results, and they lead to the conclusion that the materials provided, not innate anatomical sex differences, account for the resulting spatial configurations.The research reported here was part of the first author's dissertation. The authors gratefully acknowledge the cooperation of Holy Innocents Episcopal School and Georgia State University.     

Sex differences in number line estimation: The role of numerical estimation

Sex differences in mathematical performance have frequently been examined over the last decades indicating an advantage for males especially when numerical problems cannot be solved by (classroom‐)learnt strategies and/or estimation. Even in basic numerical tasks such as number line estimation, males were found to outperform females – with sex differences argued to emerge from different solution strategies applied by males and females. We evaluated the latter using two versions of the number line estimation task: a bounded and an unbounded task version. Assuming that women tend more strongly to apply known procedures, we expected them to be at a particular disadvantage in the unbounded number line estimation task, which is less prone to be solved by specific strategies such as proportion judgement but requires numerical estimation. Results confirmed more pronounced sex differences for unbounded number line estimation with males performing significantly more accurately in this task version. This further adds to recent evidence suggesting that estimation performance in the bounded task version may reflect solution strategies rather than numerical estimation. Additionally, it indicates that sex differences regarding the spatial representation of number magnitude may not be universal, but associated with spatial–numerical estimations in particular.     

The Ebbinghaus illusion deceives adults but not young children

The sensitivity of size perception to context has been used to distinguish between ‘vision for action’ and ‘vision for perception’, and to study cultural, psychopathological, and developmental differences in perception. The status of that evidence is much debated, however. Here we use a rigorous double dissociation paradigm based on the Ebbinghaus illusion, and find that for children below 7 years of age size discrimination is much less affected by surround size. Young children are less accurate than adults when context is helpful, but more accurate when context is misleading. Even by the age of 10 years context‐sensitivity is still not at adult levels. Therefore, size contrast as shown by the Ebbinghaus illusion is not a built‐in property of the ventral pathway subserving vision for perception but a late development of it, and low sensitivity to the Ebbinghaus illusion in autism is not primary to the pathology. Our findings also show that, although adults in Western cultures have low context‐sensitivity relative to East Asians, they have high context‐sensitivity relative to children. Overall, these findings reveal a gradual developmental trend toward ever broader contextual syntheses. Such developments are advantageous, but the price paid for them is that, when context is misleading, adults literally see the world less accurately than they did as children.     

Sex Differences in Visual Recognition Memory: Support for a Sex-Related Difference in Attention in Adults and Children

The selectivity hypothesis of Meyers-Levy (1989) proposes that cognitive sex differences reflect underlying differences in information processing between males and females. Males are considered to be more likely to organize information in a self-related manner, whereas females are more likely to adopt a comprehensive approach to information processing. We tested this hypothesis in children (10–15 years) and adults using recognition memory tasks. Tests were devised which employed male-oriented objects, female oriented objects, or random objects. In both the child and adult samples, females performed significantly better than males on tests using random and female-oriented objects. Males performed at the level of females only when tested for recognition of male-oriented objects. These results demonstrate that this sex difference is present prior to puberty and support the concept of sex differences in information processing.     

My face through the looking-glass: the effect of mirror reversal on reflection size estimation

People tend to grossly overestimate the size of their mirror-reflected face. Although this overestimation bias is robust, not much is known about its relationships to self-face perception. In two experiments, we investigated the overestimation bias as a function of the presentation of the own face (left–right reversed – as in a mirror – or nonreversed – as in a photograph), the identity of the seen face, and prior exposure to a real mirror. For this we developed a computerized task requiring size estimations of displayed faces. We replicated the observation that people overestimate the size of their mirror-reflected face and showed that the overestimation can be reduced following a brief mirror exposure. We also found that left–right reversal modulates the overestimation bias, depending on the perceived face’s identity. These data underline the enhanced familiarity of left–right reversed self-faces and the importance of size perception for understanding mirror reflection processing.     

Effects of sex and sex roles on the perceived maladaptiveness of DSM-IV personality disorder symptoms

This study investigated the influence of sex on the perceived maladaptiveness of DSM-IV personality disorder criteria based on previous findings that inconsistency of symptoms with sex roles affects the perception of personality disorder symptoms. The effects of rater characteristics (i.e., sex, sex role) were also examined. A total of 161 undergraduates (65 men, 96 women) rated the diagnostic criteria according to how maladaptive they were for males (male condition), females (female condition), or without regard to sex (neutral condition that served as a baseline) using a 7-point scale. Participants' sex role was determined using the Bem Sex Role (1981a) Inventory. Dependent and depressive personality disorder criteria (trend for borderline) were rated more maladaptive for females than males, whereas obsessive-compulsive personality disorder criteria were rated more maladaptive for males than females. Participant sex and sex role had little or no significant effects on the ratings. Results are compared with those of previous research. Methodological issues and implications for the diagnosis of personality disorders are discussed.     

When being narrow minded is a good thing: Locally biased people show stronger contextual cueing

Repeated contexts allow us to find relevant information more easily. Learning such contexts has been proposed to depend upon either global processing of the repeated contexts, or alternatively processing of the local region surrounding the target information. In this study, we measured the extent to which observers were by default biased to process towards a more global or local level. The findings showed that the ability to use context to help guide their search was strongly related to an observer's local/global processing bias. Locally biased people could use context to help improve their search better than globally biased people. The results suggest that the extent to which context can be used depends crucially on the observer's attentional bias and thus also to factors and influences that can change this bias.     

Disclosure reciprocity and liking as a function of gender and personalism

Evidence is presented that: (1) Liking and reciprocal disclosure for males and females are mediated by personalistic attributions; however, the predicted pattern was obtained for females on a willingness-to-disclose measure and for males on an appropriateness-to-disclose measure. (2) Females disclosed at higher levels of intimacy than males. Specifically, two studies are presented that show that the effect of disclosure intimacy and attribution on reciprocity and liking are influenced by subject sex, and may include sex differences in subjects' perception of the sex of the recipients of their liking and disclosure. An appropriateness-of-disclosure higher order interaction in Study II involved partner sex, intimacy, and attribution. It seemed that disclosers were careful in choosing their audience. When appropriateness of disclosing is the question, it is not so important who is doing the disclosing as who is receiving the disclosure. These findings may help to clarify the mixed evidence regarding sex differences in self-disclosure behaviors.     

Pleasant emotional induction broadens the visual world of young children

These experiments aimed at studying the influence of emotional context on global/local visual processing in children. Children 5 years old, known to present an immature global visual bias, and 8 years old, known to pay attention predominantly to global information, were placed in either a neutral or pleasant emotional context and subsequently presented with a global/local visual judgement task. As with previous findings for adults, both age groups presented a pronounced perceptual bias toward global information following exposure to emotionally pleasant pictures. Interestingly, younger children, who do not present a global bias during the neutral exposure, presented the same preference for global information as older children when exposed to the pleasant context. These findings indicate that emotion may strongly affect visual perception in children, with important implications for educational practice and models of cognition.     

Pleasant emotional induction broadens the visual world of young children

These experiments aimed at studying the influence of emotional context on global/local visual processing in children. Children 5 years old, known to present an immature global visual bias, and 8 years old, known to pay attention predominantly to global information, were placed in either a neutral or pleasant emotional context and subsequently presented with a global/local visual judgement task. As with previous findings for adults, both age groups presented a pronounced perceptual bias toward global information following exposure to emotionally pleasant pictures. Interestingly, younger children, who do not present a global bias during the neutral exposure, presented the same preference for global information as older children when exposed to the pleasant context. These findings indicate that emotion may strongly affect visual perception in children, with important implications for educational practice and models of cognition.