Integrating face and voice in person perception

Integration of information from face and voice plays a central role in our social interactions. It has been mostly studied in the context of audiovisual speech perception: integration of affective or identity information has received comparatively little scientific attention. Here, we review behavioural and neuroimaging studies of face-voice integration in the context of person perception. Clear evidence for interference between facial and vocal information has been observed during affect recognition or identity processing. Integration effects on cerebral activity are apparent both at the level of heteromodal cortical regions of convergence, particularly bilateral posterior superior temporal sulcus (pSTS), and at 'unimodal' levels of sensory processing. Whether the latter reflects feedback mechanisms or direct crosstalk between auditory and visual cortices is as yet unclear.     

Spatiotemporal pattern of appraising social and emotional relevance: Evidence from event-related brain potentials

Social information is particularly relevant for the human species because of its direct link to guiding physiological responses and behavior. Accordingly, extant functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data suggest that social content may form a unique stimulus dimension. It remains largely unknown, however, how neural activity underlying social (versus nonsocial) information processing temporally unfolds, and how such social information appraisal may interact with the processing of other stimulus characteristics, particularly emotional meaning. Here, we presented complex visual scenes differing in both social (vs. nonsocial) and emotional relevance (positive, negative, neutral) intermixed with scrambled versions of these pictures to N = 24 healthy young adults. Event-related brain potentials (ERPs) to intact pictures were examined for gaining insight to the dynamics of appraisal of both dimensions, implemented within the brain. Our main finding is an early interaction between social and emotional relevance due to enhanced amplitudes of early ERP components to emotionally positive and neutral pictures of social compared to nonsocial content, presumably reflecting rapid allocation of attention and counteracting an overall negativity bias. Importantly, our ERP data show high similarity with previously observed fMRI data using the same stimuli, and source estimations located the ERP effects in overlapping occipitotemporal brain areas. Our novel data suggest that relevance detection may occur already as early as around 100 ms after stimulus onset and may combine relevance checks not only examining intrinsic pleasantness/emotional valence but also social content as a unique, highly relevant stimulus dimension.     

Propension à discriminer à l’égard du genre et dominance sociale

This work aims to study the propensity to discriminate (PTD) (Dovidio & Helb, 2005 ; Tisserant, Wagner & Barth, 2010) against gender and other salient criteria in the working place, such as ethnic origin and religious background. More precisely, we investigated the link between PTD and the social dominance orientation (Sidanius & Pratto, 1999). 119 counsellors from French employment services answered a questionnaire dealing on concepts and attitudes towards social groups. Results show that social dominance, as a system of belief justifying social inequalities, generally predict the PTD of individuals, whatever the criterion of discrimination considered. The sex of counsellors can be considered as a moderating variable since females are less likely to accept inequalities than males do. We discuss the need for work and organizational psychologists to invest, alongside the managers, this field of research on equality, non-discrimination and diversity (ENDD).     

Exploring "fringe" consciousness: the subjective experience of perceptual fluency and its objective bases

Perceptual fluency is the subjective experience of ease with which an incoming stimulus is processed. Although perceptual fluency is assessed by speed of processing, it remains unclear how objective speed is related to subjective experiences of fluency. We present evidence that speed at different stages of the perceptual process contributes to perceptual fluency. In an experiment, figure-ground contrast influenced detection of briefly presented words, but not their identification at longer exposure durations. Conversely, font in which the word was written influenced identification, but not detection. Both contrast and font influenced subjective fluency. These findings suggest that speed of processing at different stages condensed into a unified subjective experience of perceptual fluency.     

Cross-National Variations in Behavioral Profiles Among Homeless Youth

Cross-national comparisons of homeless youth in Melbourne, Australia, and Los Angeles, CA, United States were conducted. Newly (n = 427) and experienced (n = 864) homeless youth were recruited from each site. Compared to Australia, homeless youth in the United States were younger, more likely to be in school or jail, demonstrated fewer sexual and substance use risk acts, fewer suicidal acts, and reported less need for social services. Across sites, experienced homeless youth were more likely to be older, male, engage in sexual and substance use, report greater need for social services, and make greater use of work, substance use, and health-related services. Homeless youth have different behavioral profiles in Australia and the United States, reflecting differences in the effectiveness of service systems in the two countries in keeping youth with fewer problems out of homelessness.     

Why ritualized behavior? Precaution Systems and action parsing in developmental, pathological and cultural rituals

Ritualized behavior, intuitively recognizable by its stereotypy, rigidity, repetition, and apparent lack of rational motivation, is found in a variety of life conditions, customs, and everyday practices: in cultural rituals, whether religious or non-religious; in many children's complicated routines; in the pathology of obsessive-compulsive disorders (OCD); in normal adults around certain stages of the life-cycle, birthing in particular. Combining evidence from evolutionary anthropology, neuropsychology and neuroimaging, we propose an explanation of ritualized behavior in terms of an evolved Precaution System geared to the detection of and reaction to inferred threats to fitness. This system, distinct from fear-systems geared to respond to manifest danger, includes a repertoire of clues for potential danger as well as a repertoire of species-typical precautions. In OCD pathology, this system does not supply a negative feedback to the appraisal of potential threats, resulting in doubts about the proper performance of precautions, and repetition of action. Also, anxiety levels focus the attention on low-level gestural units of behavior rather than on the goal-related higher-level units normally used in parsing the action-flow. Normally automatized actions are submitted to cognitive control. This "swamps" working memory, an effect of which is a temporary relief from intrusions but also their long-term strengthening. Normal activation of this Precaution System explains intrusions and ritual behaviors in normal adults. Gradual calibration of the system occurs through childhood rituals. Cultural mimicry of this system's normal input makes cultural rituals attention-grabbing and compelling. A number of empirical predictions follow from this synthetic model.     

Size matters: saccades during scene perception

We investigated the effect of image size on saccade amplitudes. First, in a meta-analysis, relevant results from previous scene perception studies are summarised, suggesting the possibility of a linear relationship between mean saccade amplitude and image size. Forty-eight observers viewed 96 colour scene images scaled to four different sizes, while their eye movements were recorded. Mean and median saccade amplitudes were found to be directly proportional to image size, while the mode of the distribution lay in the range of very short saccades. However, saccade amplitudes expressed as percentages of image size were not constant over the different image sizes; on smaller stimulus images, the relative saccades were found to be larger, and vice versa. In sum, and as far as mean and median saccade amplitudes are concerned, the size of stimulus images is the dominant factor. Other factors, such as image properties, viewing task, or measurement equipment, are only of subordinate importance. Thus, the role of stimulus size has to be reconsidered, in theoretical as well as methodological terms.