Dynamical patterns of human postural responses to emotional stimuli

Erotic scenes and images of mutilated bodies are emotional stimuli that have repeatedly shown to evoke specific neurophysiological responses associated with enhanced attention and perceptual processing. Remarkably however, only a handful of studies have investigated human motor reactions to emotional activation as a direct index of physical approximation or withdrawal. Given the inconclusive results of these studies, the approach-avoidance distinction, one of the most salient concepts in human motivational research, remains a broadly exploited hypothesis that has never been empirically demonstrated. Here, we investigate postural responses elicited by discrete emotional stimuli in healthy young adults. We discover that both positive and negative affective pictures induce a significant posterior deviation from postural baseline equilibrium. Further, we find that neutral pictures also evoke posterior deviation, although with a less pronounced amplitude. Exploring the dynamical evolution of postural responses to emotional pictures at high temporal resolution, we uncover a characteristic profile that remains stable for stimuli from all three affective categories. In contrast, the postural response amplitude is modulated by the emotional content of the stimulus. Our observations do not support the interpretation of postural responses to affective picture-viewing as approach-avoidance behavior. Instead, our findings indicate the involvement of a previously unrecognized motor component of the physiological mechanism underlying human orienting responses

New forms of open peer review will allow academics to separate scholarly evaluation from academic journals.

Today’s academic publishing system may be problematic, but many argue it is the only one available to provide adequate research evaluation. Pandelis Perakakis introduces an open community platform, LIBRE, which seeks to challenge the assumption that peer review can only be handled by journal editors. By embracing a new culture of open, transparent and independent research evaluation, the academic community can more productively contribute to global knowledge

HTML5 and companion web technologies as a universal platform for interactive Internet TV advertising

In this paper, we propose, design and develop a prototype interactive TV Commercial (iTVC) for the Internet Connected TV using only web technologies instead of propriety APIs or Adobe Flash, which are the most common methods up to date. The main advantage of this method is that developers can use a technology that is, or will be in the near future, compatible with most, if not all, different connected TV platforms, as the adoption of HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript is constantly gaining ground among Connected TV manufactures. We will show that, using these technologies, all of the features of a typical interactive Ad (Advertisement), such as navigation, video, audio, animation etc can be easily achieved and therefore it is a much better choice for authoring universal interactive Advertisements that will work in most platforms instead of re-developing the same Ad for each platform. © 2012 IEEE

Understanding the role of open peer review and dynamic academic articles

We welcome the commentary by L. Egghe stimulating discussion on our recent article “Natural selection of academic papers” (NSAP) that focuses on an important modern issue at the heart of the scientific enterprise — the open and continuous evaluation and evolution of research. We are also grateful to the editor of Scientometrics for giving us the opportunity to respond to some of the arguments by L. Egghe that we believe are inaccurate or require further comment

Impact of Stock Market Structure on Intertrade Time and Price Dynamics

We analyse times between consecutive transactions for a diverse group of stocks registered on the NYSE and NASDAQ markets, and we relate the dynamical properties of the intertrade times with those of the corresponding price fluctuations. We report that market structure strongly impacts the scale-invariant temporal organisation in the transaction timing of stocks, which we have observed to have long-range power-law correlations. Specifically, we find that, compared to NYSE stocks, stocks registered on the NASDAQ exhibit significantly stronger correlations in their transaction timing on scales within a trading day. Further, we find that companies that transfer from the NASDAQ to the NYSE show a reduction in the correlation strength of transaction timing on scales within a trading day, indicating influences of market structure. We also report a persistent decrease in correlation strength of intertrade times with increasing average intertrade time and with corresponding decrease in companies' market capitalization–a trend which is less pronounced for NASDAQ stocks. Surprisingly, we observe that stronger power-law correlations in intertrade times are coupled with stronger power-law correlations in absolute price returns and higher price volatility, suggesting a strong link between the dynamical properties of intertrade times and the corresponding price fluctuations over a broad range of time scales. Comparing the NYSE and NASDAQ markets, we demonstrate that the stronger correlations we find in intertrade times for NASDAQ stocks are associated with stronger correlations in absolute price returns and with higher volatility, suggesting that market structure may affect price behavior through information contained in transaction timing. These findings do not support the hypothesis of universal scaling behavior in stock dynamics that is independent of company characteristics and stock market structure. Further, our results have implications for utilising transaction timing patterns in price prediction and risk management optimization on different stock markets

Take the money and run: psychopathic behavior in the trust game

We study the association among different sources of individual differences such as personality, cognitive ability and risk attitudes with trust and reciprocate behavior in an incentivized experimental binary trust game in a sample of 220 (138 females) undergraduate students. The game involves two players, player 1 (P1) and player 2 (P2). In the first stage, P1 decides whether to trust and let P2 decide, or to secure an egalitarian payoff for both players. If P1 trusts P2, the latter can choose between a symmetric payoff that is double than the secure alternative discarded by P1, and an asymmetric payoff in which P2 earns more than in any other case but makes P1 worse off. Before the main experiment, we obtained participants’ scores for Abstract Reasoning (AR), risk attitudes, basic personality characteristics, and specific traits such as psychopathy and impulsivity. During the main experiment, we measured Heart Rate (HR) and ElectroDermal Activity (EDA) variation to account for emotional arousal caused by the decision and feedback processes. Our main findings indicate that, on one hand, P1 trust behavior associates to positive emotionality and, specifically, to the extraversion’s warmth facet. In addition, the impulsivity facet of positive urgency also favors trust behavior. No relation to trusting behavior was found for either other major personality aspects or risk attitudes. The physiological results show that participants scoring high in psychopathy exhibit increased EDA and reduced evoked HR deceleration at the moment in which they are asked to decide whether or not to trust. Regarding P2, we find that AR ability and mainly low disagreeable disinhibition favor reciprocal behavior. Specifically, lack of reciprocity significantly relates with a psychopathic, highly disinhibited and impulsive personality. Thus, the present study suggests that personality characteristics would play a significant role in different behaviors underlying cooperation, with extraversion/positive emotionality being more relevant for initiating cooperation, and low disagreeable disinhibition for maintaining it

Dynamical patterns of human postural responses to emotional stimuli

Postural displacements in response to emotional activation have recently been proposed as a direct and objective index of approach–avoidance behavior in humans. Here, we present the results of an experiment designed to assess spontaneous postural responses to discrete affective pictures, briefly presented in random order of valence. Our findings question the interpretation of phasic postural responses to emotional stimuli as approach–avoidance behavior. Further, we identify a robust dynamical pattern, characterized by specific features indicating that attentional processes may play a role in human postural responses to emotional stimul

Open Peer Review Module (OPRM)

The Open Peer Review Module (OPRM) project, funded by OpenAire and carried out by a consortium led by Open Scholar CIC and the partners DIGITAL.CSIC, e-IEO, IIIA-CSIC, ARVO Consultores and SECABA-UGR, constructs in Open Access repositories the capabilities of open peer reviews. The Open Peer Review Module includes a complex reviewer's reputation system based on the assessment of reviews by other peer reviewers. Any digital research work hosted in a repository can be evaluated by an unlimited number of peers who offer not only a qualitative assessment in the form of text, but also quantitative measures that are used to build the reputation of the research work and its authors. The OPRM was implemented in two Open Access repositories: the Institutional Repository of the Spanish National Research Council (DIGITAL.CSIC, https://digital.csic.es), and the Institutional Repository of the Spanish Institute of Oceanography (e-IEO, http://www.repositorio.ieo.es/e-ieo/

Sketching the first 45 years of the journal Psychophysiology (1964–2008): a co-word- based analysis

This article presents a keyword-based bibliometric study of the thematic evolution of the journal Psychophysiology since its first publication in 1964 until 2008. Bibliometric maps showing the most relevant associations among the main topics treated by the journal are provided separately for the periods 1964–1978, 1979–1988, 1989–1998, and 1999–2008. These maps offer insight into the conceptual structure of psychophysiology as a research discipline and help to visualize the division of the field into several interconnected subfields. Bibliometric maps created by co-word analysis can be used by both experts and novices to understand the current state of the art of a scientific field and to predict where future research could lead

Physiological and behavioral patterns of corruption

We study the behavior and emotional arousal of the participants in an experimental auction, leading to an asymmetric social dilemma involving an auctioneer and two bidders. An antisocial transfer (bribe) which is beneficial for the auctioneer (official) is paid, if promised, by the winner of the auction. Some pro-social behavior on both the auctioneers' and the bidders' sides is observed even in the absence of any punishment mechanism (Baseline, Treatment 0). However, pro-social behavior is adopted by the vast majority of subjects when the loser of the auction can inspect the transaction between the winner and the auctioneer (Inspection, Treatment 1). The inspection and punishment mechanism is such that, if a bribe is (not) revealed, both corrupt agents (the denouncing bidder) lose(s) this period's payoffs. This renders the inspection option unprofitable for the loser and is rarely used, especially towards the end of the session, when pro-social behavior becomes pervasive. Subjects' emotional arousal was obtained through skin conductance responses. Generally speaking, our findings suggest that stronger emotions are associated with decisions deviating from pure monetary reward maximization, rather than with (un)ethical behavior per se. In fact, using response times as a measure of the subject's reflection during the decision-making process, we can associate emotional arousal with the conflict between primary or instinctive and secondary or contemplative motivations and, more specifically, with deviations from the subject's pure monetary interest