Virtual Virgins and Vamps: The Effects of Exposure to Female Characters’ Sexualized Appearance and Gaze in an Immersive Virtual Environment

This experiment exposed a sample of U.S. undergraduates (43 men, 40 women) to suggestively or conservatively clad virtual females who exhibited either responsive, high eye gaze or nonresponsive, low gaze in an immersive virtual environment. Outside the virtual world, men and women who encountered a highly stereotypical character—a suggestively clad, high gaze agent (“vamp”) or conservatively clad, low gaze character (“virgin”)—demonstrated more sexism and greater rape myth acceptance than participants who saw a suggestively clad nonresponsive or conservatively clad, responsive character. Results suggest that gender-stereotypical virtual females enhance negative attitudes toward women, whereas those that violate expectations and break stereotypes do not.     

Screening for drugs in oral fluid: Illicit drug use and drug driving in a sample of urban and regional Queensland motorists

Police services in a number of Australian states and overseas jurisdictions have begun to implement or consider random road-side drug testing of drivers. This paper outlines research conducted to provide an estimate of the extent of drug driving in a sample of Queensland drivers in regional, rural and metropolitan areas. Oral fluid samples were collected from 2657 Queensland motorists and screened for illicit substances including cannabis (delta 9 tetrahydrocannibinol [THC]), amphetamines, ecstasy, and cocaine. Overall, 3.8% of the sample (n = 101) screened positive for at least one illicit substance, although multiple drugs were identified in a sample of 23 respondents. The most common drugs detected in oral fluid were ecstasy (n = 53), and cannabis (n = 46) followed by amphetamines (n = 23). A key finding was that cannabis was confirmed as the most common self-reported drug combined with driving and that individuals who tested positive to any drug through oral fluid analysis were also more likely to report the highest frequency of drug driving. Furthermore, a comparison between drug vs. drink driving detection rates for one region of the study, revealed a higher detection rate for drug driving (3.8%) vs. drink driving (0.8%). This research provides evidence that drug driving is relatively prevalent on Queensland roads, and may in fact be more common than drink driving. This paper will further outline the study findings’ and present possible directions for future drug driving research.     

Body image and explicit and implicit anti-fat attitudes: the mediating role of physical appearance comparisons

Prejudice against overweight people is rife. However, there is a paucity of research on the underlying reasons for it. In two studies the relationship between body image, the tendency to make physical appearance-related comparisons (PACS), and both explicit and implicit anti-fat attitudes was examined. In Study 1 (n = 227) people with a high tendency to make physical appearance-related comparisons (high PACS scorers) reported lower self-appearance evaluation, but higher appearance orientation and explicit anti-fat attitudes. The PACS fully mediated the relationship between appearance orientation and explicit anti-fat attitudes. Study 2 (n = 134) found that the PACS also mediated the relationship between appearance orientation and implicit anti-fat attitudes. Thus, individual differences in factors such as body image and the tendency to make appearance-related comparisons, appear to play a central role in both explicit and implicit anti-fat attitudes.     

Expressions of positive emotion in photographs,personality, and later-life marital and health outcomes

A previous study of females at an elite liberal arts college found that the degree of positive emotion expressed in persons’ college yearbook photos was correlated with personality, marital, and health outcomes decades later in life. We examine whether the same pattern is observed among respondents in the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study, using high school yearbook photographs and outcome measures obtained mostly when respondents were in their fifties. Despite some seeming advantages of our design, we were unable, with a few exceptions, to replicate the findings of the previous study. Possible explanations for this divergence in findings are discussed, including differences in measurement, the sample, and the photographic occasion itself.     

The importance of information localization in scene gist recognition

People can recognize the meaning or gist of a scene from a single glance, and a few recent studies have begun to examine the sorts of information that contribute to scene gist recognition. The authors of the present study used visual masking coupled with image manipulations (randomizing phase while maintaining the Fourier amplitude spectrum; random image structure evolution [RISE]; J. Sadr & P. Sinha, 2004) to explore whether and when unlocalized Fourier amplitude information contributes to gist perception. In 4 experiments, the authors found that differences between scene categories in the Fourier amplitude spectrum are insufficient for gist recognition or gist masking. Whereas the global 1/f spatial frequency amplitude spectra of scenes plays a role in gist masking, local phase information is necessary for gist recognition and for the strongest gist masking. Moreover, the ability to recognize the gist of a target image was influenced by mask recognizability, suggesting that conceptual masking occurs even at the earliest stages of scene processing.     

Asymmetries in visual search: An introduction

In visual search tasks, observers look for a target stimulus among distractor stimuli. A visual search asymmetry is said to occur when a search for stimulus A among stimulus B produces different results from a search for B among A. Anne Treisman made search asymmetries into an important tool in the study of visual attention. She argued that it was easier to find a target that was defined by the presence of a preattentive basic feature than to find a target defined by the absence of that feature. Four of the eight papers in this symposium inPerception & Psychophysics deal with the use of search asymmetries to identify stimulus attributes that behave as basic features in this context. Another two papers deal with the long-standing question of whether a novelty can be considered to be a basic feature. Asymmetries can also arise when one type of stimulus is easier to identify or classify than another. Levin and Angelone’s paper on visual search for faces of different races is an examination of an asymmetry of this variety. Finally, Previc and Naegele investigate an asymmetry based on the spatial location of the target. Taken as a whole, these papers illustrate the continuing value of the search asymmetry paradigm.     

On some worldly worries

Israel Scheffler and others have had trouble accepting such drastic theses in my work as that worlds, even old ones, are made by right versions, even new ones, and that two conflicting versions may both be right. But further explication shows how such theses have advantages over the more usual common-sense alternatives.Published by the author at Emerson Hall, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 02138, U.S.A., on 1 September 1988.NOTICE: This paper may be copied and circulated with due credit but without charge. (It was accepted by theJournal of Philosophy, but withdrawn by that journal on the eve of publication because of a dispute over rights.)     

On scaling models applied to data from several groups

Statistical methods are presented to facilitate a more complete analysis of results obtained when a scaling model is applied to data from two or more groups. These methods can be used to (a) compare the corresponding estimated latent distributions obtained using the scaling model applied to the different groups, (b) compare the corresponding estimated item reliabilities (or item response error rates) for the different groups, and (c) test whether the scaling model applied to the several groups can be replaced by a more parsimonious scaling model that includes various homogeneity constraints (i.e., constraints that describe which parameters in the model are the same for the several groups). Various kinds of scaling models are considered here in the multiple-group context.Support for this research was provided in part by the National Science Foundation, to Clogg by Grant No. SES-7823759 and to Goodman by Grant No. SES-8303838. Clogg and Goodman were Fellows at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences when part of the research was done, with financial support provided in part by National Science Foundation grant BNS-8011494 to the Center. The authors are indebted to Mark P. Becker and James W. Shockey for helpful comments.