Face masks have a limited effect on the feeling of being looked at

Introduction: Wearing face masks has been promoted as an effective measure to reduce the spread of COVID-19. Because face masks cover a major part of the face, they have detrimental effects on various aspects of social cognition. Yet, a highly important feature of the face is not occluded by face masks: the eyes. The eyes play an important role in social interactions: knowing where another person is looking is of central importance when interacting with others. Recent research has reported an attentional shift toward the eye region as a consequence of the widespread exposure to face masks. However, no study has yet investigated the influence of face masks on the perception of eye gaze direction. Here we investigated whether face masks have an effect on the feeling of being looked at. Assuming an attentional shift toward the eyes, we might expect more accurate gaze perception in faces wearing face masks. Methods: Sixty-five participants decided for a series of realistic avatar faces whether each face was making eye contact or not. Half of the faces wore face masks, the other half did not. For each participant and separately for each condition (mask vs. no mask), we calculated the cone of direct gaze (CoDG), a commonly used measure to quantify the range of gaze angles within which an observer assumes mutual gaze. Results: Contrary to our expectations, results show that mutual gaze is not recognized more accurately in masked faces. Rather, the CoDG was, on average, slightly wider for faces wearing masks compared to faces without masks. Discussion: Notwithstanding the relatively small effect of face mask, these findings potentially have implications on our social interactions. If we inadvertently feel looked at by an onlooker, we may react inappropriately by reciprocating the alleged approach orientation

Motivational aspects of recognizing a smile

What are the underlying processes that enable human beings to recognize a happy face? Clearly, featural and configural cues will help to identify the distinctive smile. In addition, the motivational state of the observer will influence the interpretation of emotional expressions. Therefore, a model accounting for emotion recognition is only complete if bottom-up and top-down aspects are integrate

The inversion effect on gaze perception reflects processing of component information

When faces are turned upside-down they are much more difficult to recognize than other objects. This "face inversion effect” has often been explained in terms of configural processing, which is impaired when faces are rotated away from the upright. Here we report a "gaze inversion effect” and discuss whether it is related to configural face processing of the whole face. Observers reported the gaze locations of photographed upright or inverted faces. When whole faces were presented, we found an inversion effect both for constant errors and observer sensitivity. These results were closely replicated when only the eyes were visible. Together, our findings suggest that gaze processing is largely based on component-based information from the eye region. Processing this information is orientation-sensitive and does not seem to rely on configural processing of the whole fac

Emotional expression affects the accuracy of gaze perception

Emotional facial expressions are powerful social cues. Here we investigated how emotional expression affects the interpretation of eye gaze direction. Fifty-two observers judged where faces were looking by moving a slider on a measuring bar to the respective position. The faces displayed either an angry, happy, fearful or a neutral expression and were looking either straight at the observer, or were rotated 2°, 4°, 6° or 8° to the left and right. We found that happy faces were interpreted as directed closer to the observer, while fearful and angry faces were interpreted as directed further away. Judgments were most accurate for neutral faces, followed by happy, angry and fearful faces. These findings are discussed on the background of the "self-referential positivity bias”, suggesting that happy faces are preferably interpreted as directed towards the self while negative emotions are interpreted as directed further awa

Nalokson nesespray kan redusere risikoen for dødelige heroinoverdoser

Bakgrunn: Antall overdosedødsfall blant heroinmisbrukere i Norge er høyt. Behandling med motgiften nalokson er kun tilgjengelig gjennom helsepersonell. Nalokson kan også gis som nesespray av ikke helsepersonell. Økt tilgjengelighet av nalokson kan redusere både antall fatale overdoser og fare for stikkskader og blodsmitte med hepatitt C og hiv blant helsepersonell. I denne artikkelen presenterer vi kunnskap om bruk av nalokson nesespray i behandling av opioidoverdoser. Material og metode: Vi har gjennomført søk etter relevant forskning om effekt av nalokson nesespray i databasene Medline, Embase og Cochrane library. Artikler er valgt ut basert på skjønn og forhåndsbestemte kriterier om behandling og pasientpopulasjon. Det var ingen restriksjoner på hvilken studiedesign som var benyttet eller metodologisk kvalitet. Konklusjonen er basert på innhentet material. Resultater: Ni relevante studier ble identifisert og inkludert, hvorav fire hadde kontrollgrupper men kun to var randomiserte sammenligninger. Ingen av studiene var utført i Norge. Nalokson nesespray gitt grunnet mistanke om opioidoverdose synes å føre til rask klinisk respons. Ved sammenligning med dagens praksis med injisert nalokson peker funn mot nesten like rask normalisering av åndedrett ved nesespray. Bruk av nalokson nesespray kan gi redusert behov for nalokson injeksjoner og derfor redusert fare for stikkskade blant helsepersonell. Hvis også legfolk utenom helsepersonell læres opp til å gi nalokson nesespray vil tilgjengeligheten av motgift og kunnskap rundt forebygging av overdoser kunne økes. Fortolkning: Det er foreløpig for få studier av høy kvalitet til å kunne konkludere endelig med effekt av nesespray. Men de studiene som foreligger tyder på at nalokson i form av nesespray kan være effektiv i behandlingen av overdoser. Nalokson nesespray anbefales derfor utprøved ytterligere i randomiserte studier i Norge sammenlignet med dagens praksis. Videre bør opplæringen i bruk for pårørende, brukere og ansatte i eksisterende lavterskeltiltak evalueres da dette vil kunne øke nalokson tilgjengeligheten og bidra til å redusere antallet overdosedødsfall

Menstrual cycle phase affects discrimination of infant cuteness

This study was supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF) awarded to JL (grant numbers PZ00P1_121622 and PP00P1_139072).Recent studies have shown that women are more sensitive than men to subtle cuteness differences in infant faces. It has been suggested that raised levels in estradiol and progesterone may be responsible for this advantage. We compared young women's sensitivity to computer-manipulated baby faces varying in cuteness. Thirty-six women were tested once during ovulation and once during the luteal phase of their menstrual cycle. In a two alternative forced-choice experiment, participants chose the baby which they thought was cuter (Task 1), younger (Task 2), or the baby that they would prefer to babysit (Task 3). Saliva samples to assess levels of estradiol, progesterone and testosterone were collected at each test session. During ovulation, women were more likely to choose the cuter baby than during the luteal phase, in all three tasks. These results suggest that cuteness discrimination may be driven by cyclic hormonal shifts. However none of the measured hormones were related to increased cuteness sensitivity. We speculate that other hormones than the ones measured here might be responsible for the increased sensitivity to subtle cuteness differences during ovulation.PostprintPeer reviewe

Feeling of guilt explains why people react differently to resource depletion warnings

Despite insistent warnings from climate scientists, the global environmental situation is further deteriorating. To date, only very few studies have investigated the impact of warnings on sustainable decision-making in controlled laboratory settings. Moreover, the few existing studies mainly looked at average warning reactions rather than taking individual differences into account. Here, we investigated individual differences in the reaction to resource depletion warnings and scrutinized the impact of emotions on behavioural changes by applying a resource dilemma task with warnings. Data-driven and model-free cluster analyses identified four different types of consumption behaviour. Importantly, guilt was positively related to sustainable decision-making after warnings. In contrast, a lack of guilt was associated with no behavioural change or even worse with more unsustainable behaviour after warnings. These findings contribute to the debate over effective climate change communication by demonstrating that issuing warnings about the climate crisis only leads to the intended behavioural changes if people experience guilt

The scent of attractiveness: levels of reproductive hormones explain individual differences in women's body odour

Individuals are thought to have their own distinctive body odour which reportedly plays an important role in mate choice. In the present study we investigated individual differences in body odours of women and examined whether some women generally smell more attractive than others or whether odour preferences are a matter of individual taste. We then explored whether levels of reproductive hormones explain women's body odour attractiveness, to test the idea that body odour attractiveness may act as a chemosensory marker of reproductive fitness. Fifty-seven men rated body odours of 28 healthy, naturally cycling women of reproductive age. We collected all odours at peak fertility to control for menstrual cycle effects on body odour attractiveness. Women's salivary oestradiol, progesterone, testosterone and cortisol levels were assessed at the time of odour collection to test whether hormone levels explain body odour attractiveness. We found that the men highly agreed on how attractive they found women's body odours. Interestingly, women's body odour attractiveness was predicted by their oestradiol and progesterone levels: the higher a woman's levels of oestradiol and the lower her levels of progesterone, the more attractive her body odour was rated. In showing that women's body odour attractiveness is explained by levels of female reproductive hormones, but not by levels of cortisol or testosterone, we provide evidence that body odour acts as a valid cue to potential fertility