Face masks inhibit facial cues for approachability and trustworthiness: an eyetracking study

Wearing face masks during the Covid-19 pandemic has undeniable benefits from our health perspective. However, the interpersonal costs on social interactions may have been underappreciated. Because masks obscure critical facial regions signaling approach/avoidance intent and social trust, this implies that facial inference of approachability and trustworthiness may be severely discounted. Here, in our eyetracking experiment, we show that people judged masked faces as less approachable and trustworthy. Further analyses showed that the attention directed towards the eye region relative to the mouth region mediated the effect on approachability, but not on trustworthiness. This is because for masked faces, with the mouth region obscured, visual attention is then automatically diverted away from the mouth and towards the eye region, which is an undiagnostic cue for judging a target’s approachability. Together, these findings support that mask-wearing inhibits the critical facial cues needed for social judgements

Taking a Leap of Faith: Reminders of God Lead to Greater Risk Taking

Master'sMASTER OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

Helicopter parenting through the lens of reddit: A text mining study

The study aimed to understand Reddit users’ experience with helicopter parenting through first- hand accounts. Text mining and natural language processing techniques were employed to extract data from the subreddit r/helicopterparents. A total of 713 original posts were processed from unstructured texts to tidy formats. Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA), a popular topic modeling method, was used to discover hidden themes within the corpus. The data revealed common environmental contexts of helicopter parenting (i.e., school, college, work, and home) and its implication on college decisions, privacy, and social relationships. These collectively suggested the importance of autonomy-supportive parenting and mindfulness interventions as viable solutions to the problems posed by helicopter parenting. In addition, findings lent support to past research that has identified more maternal than paternal models of helicopter parenting. Further research on the implications of the COVID-19 pandemic on helicopter parenting is warranted

KINEMATICS ANALYSIS OF ANKLE EVERSION SPRAIN IN SPORTS ONE CASE DURINGTHE 2010 FIFA WORLD CUP

The purpose of this study was to present the 3-dimensional ankle joint kinematics of an eversion ankle sprain case with MBIM motion analysis technique. The results showed that the maximum eversion angle occurred 0.20 seconds after trampled. At that time, the ankle joint was 25° everted, 42° externally rotated, and 15° plantarflexed. The Maximum eversion velocity was 210deg/s. The results from the MBIM technique could contribute to the understanding of the injury mechanism of ankle sprain injury

Close-knit ties through thick and thin: sharing social exclusion and acceptance enhances social bond

Three experiments investigated whether and why sharing experiences of social exclusion or social acceptance with others strengthens social bonds. Participants experienced either social exclusion or social acceptance alongside another co-participant who either also experienced the same outcome, or experienced a different outcome, as them. Multilevel modeling results showed that participant dyads who shared the experience of social exclusion or social acceptance felt closer to each other than those who experienced different outcomes, and that perceived similarity mediated the effect of shared experiences on social bonds. Interestingly, participants felt closer to one another after having shared social acceptance, more so than when they have shared social exclusion. Implications of the present findings are interpreted in light of theories of social exclusion, shared experiences, and social bonding

Spindle oscillations are generated in the dorsal thalamus and modulated by the thalamic reticular nucleus

Spindle waves occur during the early stage of slow wave sleep and are thought to arise in the thalamic reticular nucleus (TRN), causing inhibitory postsynaptic potential spindle-like oscillations in the dorsal thalamus that are propagated to the cortex. We have found that thalamocortical neurons exhibit membrane oscillations that have spindle frequencies, consist of excitatory postsynaptic potentials, and co-occur with electroencephalographic spindles. TRN lesioning prolonged oscillations in the medial geniculate body (MGB) and auditory cortex (AC). Injection of GABA~A~ antagonist into the MGB decreased oscillation frequency, while injection of GABA~B~ antagonist increased spindle oscillations in the MGB and cortex. Thus, spindles originate in the dorsal thalamus and TRN inhibitory inputs modulate this process, with fast inhibition facilitating the internal frequency and slow inhibition limiting spindle occurrence

Differential impact of affective and cognitive attributes on preference under deliberation and distraction

Two experiments were designed to test the hypothesis that affective information looms relatively larger than cognitive information when individuals are distracted for a period of time compared to when they engage in deliberative thinking. In two studies, participants were presented with information about 4 decision alternatives: An affective alternative that scored high on affective attributes but low on cognitive attributes, a cognitive alternative with the opposite trade-off, and two fillers. They were then asked to indicate their attitudes toward each of four decision alternatives either immediately, after a period of deliberation, or after a period of distraction. The results of both experiments demonstrated that participants significantly preferred the affective alternative to the cognitive alternative after distraction, but not after deliberation. The implications for understanding when and how unconscious thought may lead to better decisions are being discussed

Beyond Transmitting Bits: Context, Semantics, and Task-Oriented Communications

Communication systems to date primarily aim at reliably communicating bit sequences. Such an approach provides efficient engineering designs that are agnostic to the meanings of the messages or to the goal that the message exchange aims to achieve. Next generation systems, however, can be potentially enriched by folding message semantics and goals of communication into their design. Further, these systems can be made cognizant of the context in which communication exchange takes place, providing avenues for novel design insights. This tutorial summarizes the efforts to date, starting from its early adaptations, semantic-aware and task-oriented communications, covering the foundations, algorithms and potential implementations. The focus is on approaches that utilize information theory to provide the foundations, as well as the significant role of learning in semantics and task-aware communications.Comment: 28 pages, 14 figure

E2F1 Suppresses Oxidative Metabolism and Endothelial Differentiation of Bone Marrow Progenitor Cells

RATIONALE: The majority of current cardiovascular cell therapy trials use bone marrow progenitor cells (BM PCs) and achieve only modest efficacy; the limited potential of these cells to differentiate into endothelial-lineage cells is one of the major barriers to the success of this promising therapy. We have previously reported that the E2F transcription factor 1 (E2F1) is a repressor of revascularization after ischemic injury. OBJECTIVE: We sought to define the role of E2F1 in the regulation of BM PC function. METHODS AND RESULTS: Ablation of E2F1 (E2F1 deficient) in mouse BM PCs increases oxidative metabolism and reduces lactate production, resulting in enhanced endothelial differentiation. The metabolic switch in E2F1-deficient BM PCs is mediated by a reduction in the expression of pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase 4 and pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase 2; overexpression of pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase 4 reverses the enhancement of oxidative metabolism and endothelial differentiation. Deletion of E2F1 in the BM increases the amount of PC-derived endothelial cells in the ischemic myocardium, enhances vascular growth, reduces infarct size, and improves cardiac function after myocardial infarction. CONCLUSION: Our results suggest a novel mechanism by which E2F1 mediates the metabolic control of BM PC differentiation, and strategies that inhibit E2F1 or enhance oxidative metabolism in BM PCs may improve the effectiveness of cell therapy