Reduced empathic responses for sexually objectified women: An fMRI investigation

Sexual objectification is a widespread phenomenon characterized by a focus on the individual's physical appearance over his/her mental state. This has been associated with negative social consequences, as objectified individuals are judged to be less human, competent, and moral. Moreover, behavioral responses toward the person change as a function of the degree of the perceived sexual objectification. In the present study, we investigated how behavioral and neural representations of other social pain are modulated by the degree of sexual objectification of the target. Using a within-subject fMRI design, we found reduced empathic feelings for positive (but not negative) emotions toward sexually objectified women as compared to non-objectified (personalized) women when witnessing their participation to a ball-tossing game. At the brain level, empathy for social exclusion of personalized women recruited areas coding the affective component of pain (i.e., anterior insula and cingulate cortex), the somatosensory components of pain (i.e., posterior insula and secondary somatosensory cortex) together with the mentalizing network (i.e., middle frontal cortex) to a greater extent than for the sexually objectified women. This diminished empathy is discussed in light of the gender-based violence that is afflicting the modern society

On the origin of beliefs about the sexual orientation and gender-role development of children raised by gay-male and heterosexual parents : An Italian study

In three studies, heterosexual participants were presented with descriptions of heterosexual and gay-male parents. Importantly, the level of gender-role conformity of the gay-male parents was experimentally manipulated, resulting in their level of gender-role conformity ranging from high to low. Compared to the son of a heterosexual couple, the son of all gay-male couples had a lower expected likelihood of developing as heterosexual. This result was independent of the level of gender-role conformity of the gay-male couples (study 1–3). The beliefs about the gender-role development of the son, in terms of anticipated masculinity (study 1), gender stereotyping (study 2), and affective adjustment (study 3), mapped onto the level of gender-role conformity of the parents, regardless of their sexual orientation. Also, heterosexual parents were consistently judged more positively than gay-male parents, independently of their level of gender-role conformity (study 1–3). Results were discussed within the theoretical framework of stereotypes about gay-male parenting

Reduced shared emotional representations toward women revealing more skin

Extensive experimental research has been conducted to investigate how individuals empathise with others depending on contextual and motivational factors. However, the effect of sexual objectification (i.e. focus on the individual's physical appearance over his/her mental state) on empathy is scarce at best thus far. The aim of this work is to shed light on whether objectification modulates empathic responses toward humans and human-like objects. In Experiment 1, participants either underwent visuo-tactile stimulation or witnessed another person (a mannequin, a sexualized or a non-sexualized female confederate) being stimulated with pleasant or unpleasant objects. Participants were then asked to report either their own or the other's emotional experience. Results showed that shared representations (i.e. similarity between self-other emotional ratings) are significantly lower for the mannequin, intermediate for the sexualized woman, and reach the highest values for the non-sexualized woman. In Experiment 2, shared representations were assessed during a ball-tossing game in which the participants or one of the two confederates (sexualized or non-sexualized woman) were excluded from the game. Again, results showed reduced similarity between self-other emotional ratings toward sexualized as compared to non-sexualized women. The findings suggest that interacting with sexually objectified women reduces empathic responses typically observed within human relations

Does Sex Really Sell? Paradoxical Effects of Sexualization in Advertising on Product Attractiveness and Purchase Intentions

To test the “sex sells” assumption, we examined how Italian men and women react to sexualized advertising. Women showed lower product attractiveness and purchase intentions toward products presented with sexualized female models than with neutral ads, whereas men were unaffected by ads’ sexualization (Study 1, n = 251). Study 2 (n = 197) replicated the overall results. Study 3 (n = 198) tested hostile sexism as a moderator as well as negative emotions as a mediator of consumers’ responses. Especially men with higher hostile sexism showed more purchase intentions after viewing female sexualized ads than neutral ads.Moreover, women’s lower consumer responses toward sexualized female ads were due to higher negative emotions. Study 4 (n = 207) included ads with both female and male models, replicating responses to female sexualization and showing that both women and men had lower product attractiveness and purchase intentions toward male sexualized ads than neutral ads. Replicating and extending Study 3’s results, women’s negative emotions was the mediator. The present study has practical implications for marketers because it suggests that “sex does not sell.” In addition, considering both the psychological damage and practical inefficacy of sexualized ads, our findings have important implications for public policy

Age stereotyping of gay and heterosexual men: Why does a minority sexual orientation blur the age of old men, in particular?

This research examined age stereotyping of male individuals displaying intersectional memberships stemming from the combination of age (Young vs. Elderly) and sexual orientation categories (Gay vs. Heterosexual). We found that the age stereotypes of ‘Elderly gay men’ were blurred: ‘Elderly gay men’ were stereotyped less on elderly- and more on young-stereotypical traits than both ‘Elderly heterosexual men’ (Study 1) and ‘Elderly men’ (Studies 2–4). These findings did not occur with any subtype, as was also not the case for ‘Elderly right-handed men’ (Study 3), but replicate only with atypical subtypes (Study 4). Indeed, the blurring of the age stereotypes for ‘Elderly gay men’ was replicated for an additional atypical subtype, ‘Elderly Atheist men’, and amplified when the atypical subtype involved ‘Elderly men’ in combination with ‘Athlete men’, whose stereotypes implied youthful traits (Study 4). The results informed cognitive models of multiple category stereotyping

Implicit Associations and Alcohol: What Grabs Our Attention?

The Incentive Sensitization Theory of Addiction claims that drug induced sensitization of the mesocorticolymbic system increases the salience of the drug related stimuli. In so doing, drug related stimuli become attention grabbing for an addictive person. We tried to understand the socio-cognitive underpinnings of this process in case of alcohol addiction. The present study involves a group of participants that had alcohol related problems and a non clinical sample. We suggest that two implicit automatic mechanisms could predict the attention towards alcohol related stimuli: the self relevance of the alcohol related stimuli and the evaluation attributed to the same stimuli. The Implicit Association Task was used to determine the strength of these mechanisms (i.e., self-relevance and alcohol evaluation). The attention toward alcohol related stimuli was assessed with the Visual Dot Probe Task. Results showed that the two groups significantly differed on the IAT scores, indicating stronger associations between self and alcohol, and between alcohol and positive words for participants that had alcohol related problems. Moreover a stronger association between the self and the alcohol was a significant and positive predictor of the attentional salience of the alcohol stimuli for the clinical sample, but not for the control group