Exploring Women's State-Level Anxiety in Response to Virtual Reality Erotica.

Virtual Reality (VR)-based treatments for anxiety disorders are efficacious but there is a lack of research examining anxious responses to VR erotica, which could innovate treatments for sexual difficulties. We examined erotica features that elicited anxiety and sexual presence in women. Thirty-eight women viewed erotic videos from different modalities (2D, VR) and points of view (1st, 3rd person) and completed anxiety and sexual presence measures before and after each video. Women experienced greater anxiety for VR than 2D films and reported the most anxiety for VR 1st person films. Sexual presence was affected by modality and point of view.

The Psychology of Athletic Endeavor.

A considerable amount of human behavior occurs within the context of sports. In recent years there have been notable advances in psychological science research applied to understanding athletic endeavor. This work has utilized a number of novel theoretical, methodological, and data analytic approaches. We review the current evidence related to developmental considerations, intrapersonal athlete factors, group processes, and the role of the coach in explaining how athletes function within the sport domain. This body of work sheds light on the diverse ways in which psychological processes contribute to athletic strivings. It also has the potential to spark interest in domains of psychology concerned with achievement as well as to encourage cross-domain fertilization of ideas.

Eyes meet, hands greet: The art of timing in social interactions.

Shaking hands is a fundamental form of social interaction. The current study used high-definition cameras during a university graduation ceremony to examine the temporal sequencing of eye contact and shaking hands. Analyses revealed that mutual gaze always preceded shaking hands. A follow up investigation manipulated gaze when shaking hands, and found that participants take significantly longer to accept a handshake when an outstretched hand precedes eye contact. These findings demonstrate that the timing between a person's gaze and their offer to shake hands is critical to how their action is interpreted.

The Medusa effect reveals levels of mind perception in pictures.

Throughout our species history, humans have created pictures. The resulting picture record reveals an overwhelming preference for depicting things with minds. This preference suggests that pictures capture something of the mind that is significant to us, albeit at reduced potency. Here, we show that abstraction dims the perceived mind, even within the same picture. In a series of experiments, people were perceived as more real, and higher in both Agency (ability to do) and Experience (ability to feel), when they were presented as pictures than when they were presented as pictures of pictures. This pattern persisted across different tasks and even when comparators were matched for identity and image size. Viewers spontaneously discriminated between different levels of abstraction during eye tracking and were less willing to share money with a more abstracted person in a dictator game. Given that mind perception underpins moral judgement, our findings suggest that depicted persons will receive greater or lesser ethical consideration, depending on the level of abstraction.

Autistic traits and anthropomorphism: the case of vehicle fascia perception.

Individuals high in autistic traits can have difficulties with social interactions which may stem from difficulties with mentalizing abilities, yet findings from research investigating anthropomorphism of non-human objects in high trait individuals are inconsistent. Measuring emotions and attributes of front-facing vehicles, individuals scoring high versus low on the AQ-10 were compared for ratings of angry-happy, hostile-friendly, masculine-feminine, and submissive-dominant, as a function of vehicle size (large versus small). Our results showed that participants perceived large vehicles as more angry, hostile, masculine, and dominant than small vehicles, with no significant difference in ratings between high and low AQ-10 scorers. The current findings support previous research reporting high autistic trait individuals' intact object processing. Our novel findings also suggest high autistic trait individuals' anthropomorphizing abilities are comparable to those found in low autistic trait individuals.

The Interacting Effects of Height and Shoulder-to-Hip Ratio on Perceptions of Attractiveness, Masculinity, and Fighting Ability: Experimental Design and Ecological Validity Considerations.

Previous research has shown that men's height and upper body size are both associated with the perception of attractiveness, because they might be cues to men's genetic fitness, fighting ability, and resource holding power. However, the combined effects of men's height and upper body size have not been explored. In this research, across four studies (N = 659 heterosexual women), we systematically explored the perception of men's muscular upper body at different heights on perceptions of attractiveness, masculinity, and fighting ability. Women rated male stimuli with heights ranging from 160 cm (5'3″) to 190 cm (6'3″) and three values of shoulder-to-hip ratio (SHR). In general, results showed that women considered taller men and men with larger SHR as more attractive, masculine, and better in fighting ability. However, a robust interaction between height and SHR was dependent on participants being exposed to variation on both variables and the ecological validity of the stimuli (silhouettes vs. more realistic rendered figures).

Neural Correlates and Perceived Attractiveness of Male and Female Shoulder-to-Hip Ratio in Men and Women: An EEG Study.

While there are studies regarding the neural correlates of human facial attractiveness, there are few investigations considering neural responses for body form attractiveness. The most prominent physical feature defining men's attractiveness is their physical fitness and upper body strength. Shoulder-to-hip ratio (SHR), a sexually dimorphic trait in humans, is an indicator of men's attractiveness for both men and women. The current study is the first to report on the neurophysiological responses to male and female body forms varying in SHR in healthy heterosexual men and women observers. Electroencephalographic (EEG) signals were acquired while participants completed an oddball task as well as a subsequent attractiveness judgement task. Behavioral results showed larger SHRs were considered more attractive than smaller SHRs, regardless of stimuli and participants' sex. The electrophysiological results for both the oddball task and the explicit judgement of attractiveness showed that brain activity related to male SHR body stimuli differed depending on the specific ratios, both at early and late processing stages. For female avatars, SHR did not modulate neural activity. Collectively the data implicate posterior brain regions in the perception of body forms that differ in attractiveness vis-a-vis variation of SHR, and frontal brain regions when such perceptions are rated explicitly.

Eye tracking: empirical foundations for a minimal reporting guideline.

In this paper, we present a review of how the various aspects of any study using an eye tracker (such as the instrument, methodology, environment, participant, etc.) affect the quality of the recorded eye-tracking data and the obtained eye-movement and gaze measures. We take this review to represent the empirical foundation for reporting guidelines of any study involving an eye tracker. We compare this empirical foundation to five existing reporting guidelines and to a database of 207 published eye-tracking studies. We find that reporting guidelines vary substantially and do not match with actual reporting practices. We end by deriving a minimal, flexible reporting guideline based on empirical research (Section "An empirically based minimal reporting guideline").

Virtual Reality Erotica: Exploring General Presence, Sexual Presence, Sexual Arousal, and Sexual Desire in Women.

Virtual reality (VR) media using a three-dimensional (3D) camera facilitates an immersive experience compared to traditional two-dimensional (2D) formats. In this novel study, we used high quality, women-centered erotica and examined whether stimulus modality (VR vs. 2D) and point of view (POV: first-person vs. third-person) impacted women's feelings of sexual presence (activation of sexual response induced by the perception of being present), sexual arousal, and sexual desire (dyadic and solitary). We also investigated the effects of stimulus modality on feelings of general presence (a sense of "being there"). Results from 38 women indicated that with medium to large effects, general presence, sexual presence, and sexual arousal were significantly higher for VR videos relative to 2D videos. Sexual presence was higher for first-person POV depending on the order of film exposure. A general trend toward increasing dyadic sexual desire over the course of the study was observed. No significant differences were observed for solitary sexual desire. These findings support the adaptability of VR media to sex research and show that it can induce feelings of sexual presence and presence more generally. That sexual arousal was positively impacted by VR erotica may have implications for addressing the limitations that accompany other stimulus modalities used to elicit sexual responses in women.

When eyes beat lips: speaker gaze affects audiovisual integration in the McGurk illusion.

Eye contact is a dynamic social signal that captures attention and plays a critical role in human communication. In particular, direct gaze often accompanies communicative acts in an ostensive function: a speaker directs her gaze towards the addressee to highlight the fact that this message is being intentionally communicated to her. The addressee, in turn, integrates the speaker's auditory and visual speech signals (i.e., her vocal sounds and lip movements) into a unitary percept. It is an open question whether the speaker's gaze affects how the addressee integrates the speaker's multisensory speech signals. We investigated this question using the classic McGurk illusion, an illusory percept created by presenting mismatching auditory (vocal sounds) and visual information (speaker's lip movements). Specifically, we manipulated whether the speaker (a) moved his eyelids up/down (i.e., open/closed his eyes) prior to speaking or did not show any eye motion, and (b) spoke with open or closed eyes. When the speaker's eyes moved (i.e., opened or closed) before an utterance, and when the speaker spoke with closed eyes, the McGurk illusion was weakened (i.e., addressees reported significantly fewer illusory percepts). In line with previous research, this suggests that motion (opening or closing), as well as the closed state of the speaker's eyes, captured addressees' attention, thereby reducing the influence of the speaker's lip movements on the addressees' audiovisual integration process. Our findings reaffirm the power of speaker gaze to guide attention, showing that its dynamics can modulate low-level processes such as the integration of multisensory speech signals.

Hormones and visual attention to sexual stimuli in older men: an exploratory investigation.

BACKGROUND: Testosterone is associated with sexual desire and performance in men, but little is known about cognitive mechanisms underlying this relationship. Even less is known about the influence of estradiol, despite its production from testosterone, and high receptor density in brain regions related to male sexual behavior. METHOD: We used eye-tracking to compare men's visual attention to images of fully clothed (i.e. neutral) and minimally clothed (i.e. sexy) models in three groups: androgen-deprived (n = 6) and not androgen-deprived with prostate cancer (n = 11), and healthy controls (n = 7). We also assessed effects of serum testosterone, estradiol, and sex hormone-binding globulin levels. RESULTS: We found no group effect for fixations to sexy compared to neutral images, and no influence of testosterone on either total fixations, or proportion of fixations to sexy images. In contrast, we found that sex hormone binding globulin positively predicted total fixations, and estradiol positively predicted proportion of total fixations on sexy images--regardless of androgen treatment status. CONCLUSION: Our results suggest that visual attention to sexual stimuli in men may be significantly affected by hormones. This has potential implications for clinical populations that experience sexual side effects, such as prostate cancer patients on androgen deprivation therapy.

Head and eye movements are each facilitated by the offset of a central fixation point in a virtual gap paradigm.

Eye movements exhibit reduced latencies when the point of fixation is extinguished prior to, or coincident with, the appearance of a peripheral target. Two independent components are responsible for this facilitation. If the offset occurs before target onset, it presents a warning which stimulates response preparation and execution. If offset occurs prior to or coincident with target onset, it triggers the release of fixation-maintenance neurons in the superior colliculus that can delay saccadic responses. While the warning effect facilitates responses regardless of effector, the fixation release effect is thought to be specific to the oculomotor system. Head movements, like saccades, contribute significantly to gaze shifts and may be generated directly by the SC. While head movements have been shown to benefit from the warning effect, it is unknown if, and to what degree, they are affected by the release of fixation-maintenance neurons responsible for inhibiting saccades. To address this issue, we measured head and eye response latencies in a virtual reality-based gap paradigm, turning off the fixation point either 200 ms before (temporal gap condition), coincident with (step condition), or 1000 ms after (temporal overlap/baseline condition) target onset. Our results indicate that head movements, like saccades, are facilitated by both the warning and release components of the gap paradigm. Further, rotational kinematics during gap trials differed significantly from those observed in step and overlap trials (higher, earlier peak velocities). These results are discussed with respect to the theorized structure and organisation of the superior colliculus in humans.

Associations of political orientation, xenophobia, right-wing authoritarianism, and concern of COVID-19: Cognitive responses to an actual pathogen threat.

Previous research has related the existence of pathogenic threat to an individual's social cognition, with people avoiding physical interactions with those who have potential contagion risks. These pathogenic induced behavioral responses have broader social consequences, such as avoidance of outgroup members or negative reactions to individuals foreign to one's own group. Specially, higher pathogen threat is associated with xenophobic attitudes and ideological tendencies, such as authoritarianism and political conservatism. The COVID-19 pandemic provides an unprecedented opportunity to investigate the effect of pathogenic threat on the above-mentioned variables in a real-world situation. Collecting data during a low (N = 598) and heightened (N = 309) perceived threat of the COVID-19 pandemic in the US, our results reveal that Right-Wing Authoritarian traits, but not xenophobia, increase with a rise in the number of national pathogenic cases. Moreover, our results replicate previous findings regarding the associations between pathogen threat, political orientation, xenophobia, and Right-Wing Authoritarianism, in an actual pathogen threat scenario.

Visual exploration of omnidirectional panoramic scenes.

How do we explore the visual environment around us, and how are head and eye movements coordinated during our exploration? To investigate this question, we had observers look at omnidirectional panoramic scenes, composed of both landscape and fractal images, using a virtual reality viewer while their eye and head movements were tracked. We analyzed the spatial distribution of eye fixations and the distribution of saccade directions and the spatial distribution of head positions and the distribution of head shifts, as well as the relation between eye and head movements. The results show that, for landscape scenes, eye and head behavior best fit the allocentric frame defined by the scene horizon, especially when head tilt (i.e., head rotation around the view axis) is considered. For fractal scenes, which have an isotropic texture, eye and head movements were executed primarily along the cardinal directions in world coordinates. The results also show that eye and head movements are closely linked in space and time in a complementary way, with stimulus-driven eye movements predominantly leading the head movements. Our study is the first to systematically examine eye and head movements in a panoramic virtual reality environment, and the results demonstrate that a virtual reality environment constitutes a powerful and informative research alternative to traditional methods for investigating looking behavior.

Turning the (virtual) world around: Patterns in saccade direction vary with picture orientation and shape in virtual reality.

Research investigating gaze in natural scenes has identified a number of spatial biases in where people look, but it is unclear whether these are partly due to constrained testing environments (e.g., a participant with their head restrained and looking at a landscape image framed within a computer monitor). We examined the extent to which image shape (square vs. circle), image rotation, and image content (landscapes vs. fractal images) influence eye and head movements in virtual reality (VR). Both the eyes and head were tracked while observers looked at natural scenes in a virtual environment. In line with previous work, we found a bias for saccade directions parallel to the image horizon, regardless of image shape or content. We found that, when allowed to do so, observers move both their eyes and head to explore images. Head rotation, however, was idiosyncratic; some observers rotated a lot, whereas others did not. Interestingly, the head rotated in line with the rotation of landscape but not fractal images. That head rotation and gaze direction respond differently to image content suggests that they may be under different control systems. We discuss our findings in relation to current theories on head and eye movement control and how insights from VR might inform more traditional eye-tracking studies.

The Quiet Eye and Expertise: Sustained Fixations Do Not Transfer to Unpracticed Throws Among Expert Dart Players.

The length of the last visual fixation before the critical final phase of a movement-the quiet eye (QE) fixation-is positively correlated with expertise and success. The present study tested the potential for intraskill transfer of QE durations in order to determine whether it is intrinsically linked to expertise development or is a separable skill that may be employed to improve performance under novel circumstances. The authors tracked highly skilled dart throwers' gazes while they executed familiar (highly practiced) and familiar yet novel (distance/effector-modified) sport-specific actions. QE duration was significantly reduced when performing in unfamiliar conditions, suggesting that QE does not transfer to atypical conditions and may therefore be a result of-rather than a contributor to-expertise development. These results imply that intraskill transfer of QE is limited and, consistent with the inhibition hypothesis of QE development, argue against the value of teaching QE as an independent means of improving performance.

Win-Concurrent Sensory Cues Can Promote Riskier Choice.

Reward-related stimuli can potently influence behavior; for example, exposure to drug-paired cues can trigger drug use and relapse in people with addictions. Psychological mechanisms that generate such outcomes likely include cue-induced cravings and attentional biases. Recent animal data suggest another candidate mechanism: reward-paired cues can enhance risky decision making, yet whether this translates to humans is unknown. Here, we examined whether sensory reward-paired cues alter decision making under uncertainty and risk, as measured respectively by the Iowa Gambling Task and a two-choice lottery task. In the cued versions of both tasks, gain feedback was augmented with reward-concurrent audiovisual stimuli. Healthy human volunteers (53 males, 78 females) performed each task once, one with and the other without cues (cued Iowa Gambling Task/uncued Vancouver Gambling Task: n = 63; uncued Iowa Gambling Task/cued Vancouver Gambling Task: n = 68), with concurrent eye-tracking. Reward-paired cues did not affect choice on the Iowa Gambling Task. On the two-choice lottery task, the cued group displayed riskier choice and reduced sensitivity to probability information. The cued condition was associated with reduced eye fixations on probability information shown on the screen and greater pupil dilation related to decision and reward anticipation. This pupil effect was unrelated to the risk-promoting effects of cues: the degree of pupil dilation for risky versus risk-averse choices did not differ as a function of cues. Together, our data show that sensory reward cues can promote riskier decisions and have additional and distinct effects on arousal.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Animal data suggest that reward-paired cues can promote maladaptive reward-seeking by biasing cost-benefit decision making. Whether this finding translates to humans is unknown. We examined the effects of salient reward-paired audiovisual cues on decision making under risk and uncertainty in human volunteers. Cues had risk-promoting effects on a risky choice task and independently increased task-related arousal as measured by pupil dilation. By demonstrating risk-promoting effects of cues in human participants, our data identify a mechanism whereby cue reactivity could translate into maladaptive behavioral outcomes in people with addictions.

Are mind wandering rates an artifact of the probe-caught method? Using self-caught mind wandering in the classroom to test, and reject, this possibility.

Mind wandering (MW) reports often rely on individuals responding to specific external thought probes. Researchers have used this probe-caught method almost exclusively, due to its reliability across a wide range of testing situations. However, it remains an open question whether the probe-caught MW rates in more complex settings converge with those for simpler tasks, because of the rather artificial and controlled nature of the probe-caught methodology itself, which is shared across the different settings. To address this issue, we measured MW in a real-world lecture, during which students indicated whether they were mind wandering by simply catching themselves (as one would normally do in real life) or by catching themselves and responding to thought probes. Across three separate lectures, self-caught MW reports were stable and unaffected by the inclusion of MW probes. That the probe rates were similar to those found in prior classroom research and did not affect the self-caught MW rates strongly suggests that the past consistency of probe-caught MW rates across a range of different settings is not an artifact of the thought-probe method. Our study also indicates that the self-caught MW methodology is a reliable way to acquire MW data. The extension of measurement techniques to include students' self-caught reports provides valuable information about how to successfully and naturalistically monitor MW in lecture settings, outside the laboratory.

The Blur of Pleasure: Appetitively Appealing Stimuli Decrease Subjective Temporal Perceptual Acuity.

Anecdotal reports that time "flies by" or "slows down" during emotional events are supported by evidence that the motivational relevance of stimuli influences subsequent duration judgments. Yet it is unknown whether the subjective quality of events as they unfold is altered by motivational relevance. In a novel paradigm, we measured the subjective experience of moment-to-moment visual perception. Participants judged the temporal smoothness of high-approach positive images (desserts), negative images (e.g., of bodily mutilation), and neutral images (commonplace scenes) as they faded to black. Results revealed approach-motivated blurring, such that positive stimuli were judged as smoother and negative stimuli as choppier relative to neutral stimuli. Participants' ratings of approach motivation predicted perceived fade smoothness after we controlled for low-level stimulus features. Electrophysiological data indicated that approach-motivated blurring modulated relatively rapid perceptual activation. These results indicate that stimulus value influences subjective temporal perceptual acuity; approach-motivating stimuli elicit perception of a "blurred" frame rate characteristic of speeded motion.