Suboptimal Exposure to Facial Expressions When Viewing Video Messages From a Small Screen: Effects on Emotion, Attention, and Memory.

The authors examined the effects of suboptimally presented facial expressions on emotional and attentional responses and memory among 39 young adults viewing video (business news) messages from a small screen. Facial electromyography (EMG) and respiratory sinus arrhythmia were used as physiological measures of emotion and attention, respectively. Several congruency priming effects were found. In particular, happy facial primes prompted increased (a) pleasure ratings, (b) orbicularis oculi EMG activity, (c) perceived trustworthiness, and (d) recognition memory for video messages with a positive emotional tone. Emotional and other responses to video messages presented on a small screen can be modified with suboptimal affective primes, but even small differences in the emotional tone of the messages should be allowed for. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Physiological compliance for social gaming analysis: Cooperative versus competitive play

We report the results of an empirical study demonstrating the value of using physiological compliance as a measure of social presence during digital game playing. The physiological activity (facial EMG, electrodermal activity, cardiac activity and respiration) of 21 dyads were acquired synchronously while they were playing a digital game either cooperatively or competitively and either at home or in the laboratory. Physiological compliance was defined as the correlation between the physiological signals of the dyad members. The results of this study confirm that physiological compliance is higher in a conflicting situation than when playing cooperatively. Importantly, the results also demonstrate that physiological compliance is related to self-reported social presence. This suggests that physiological compliance is not limited to negative situations but rather increases due to rich interactions. Only minor differences in physiological compliance were observed between home play and laboratory play, suggesting the ecological validity of laboratory measures. Finally, we propose that compliance measures can be considered as objective indices of social presence in digital gaming.     

Type A factors as predictors of changes in the metabolic syndrome precursors in adolescents and young adults: A 3-year follow-up study.

The predictive associations of Type A factors with changes in some essential parameters of the cluster of disorders known as metabolic syndrome (Syndrome X) were studied during a 3-year follow-up period in 1,147 randomly selected healthy adolescents and young adults. Type A behavior was measured with the Hunter Wolf A-B Rating Scale. Physiological parameters studied were serum insulin, high-density and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, triglycerides (TG), systolic and diastolic blood pressure, body-mass index (BMI), subscapular skinfold thickness (SSF), and centrality index. Among the Type A factors in boys and men, high baseline Aggression predicted an increase in the individual parameters of metabolic syndrome (i.e., insulin, TG, SSF, and BMI) as well as a global aggravation of the cluster of metabolic parameters. In girls and women, increases in Eagerness-Energy and Responsibility across the 3 years of follow-up predicted an increase in serum insulin and a decrease in SSF, respectively (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Learning loops – interactions between guided reflection and experience‐based learning in a serious game activity

In a study on experience‐based learning in serious games, 45 players were tested for topic comprehension by a questionnaire administered before and after playing the single‐player serious game Peacemaker (Impact Games 2007). Players were divided into two activity conditions: 20 played a 1‐h game with a 3‐min half‐time break to complete an affect self‐report form while 25 also participated in a 20‐min reflective group discussion during their half‐time break. During the discussion, they were asked by an experimenter to reflect on a set of topics related to the game. We present the analysis of the questionnaires, which illustrates that contrary to our expectations the reflection period had a negative effect on the learning of the players as judged by their performance on closed‐form questions at levels 1–5 (out of 6) on the Bloom taxonomy of learning outcomes. The questionnaire also included a few open questions which gave the players a possibility to display deep (level 6) learning. The players did not differ significantly between conditions regarding the questions measuring deep learning.     

The psychophysiology of James Bond: Phasic emotional responses to violent video game events.

The authors examined emotional valence- and arousal-related phasic psychophysiological responses to different violent events in the first-person shooter video game "James Bond 007: NightFire" among 36 young adults. Event-related changes in zygomaticus major, corrugator supercilii, and orbicularis oculi electromyographic (EMG) activity and skin conductance level (SCL) were recorded, and the participants rated their emotions and the trait psychoticism based on the Psychoticism dimension of the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire--Revised, Short Form. Wounding and killing the opponent elicited an increase in SCL and a decrease in zygomatic and orbicularis oculi EMG activity. The decrease in zygomatic and orbicularis oculi activity was less pronounced among high Psychoticism scorers compared with low Psychoticism scorers. The wounding and death of the player's own character (James Bond) elicited an increase in SCL and zygomatic and orbicularis oculi EMG activity and a decrease in corrugator activity. Instead of joy resulting from victory and success, wounding and killing the opponent may elicit high-arousal negative affect (anxiety), with high Psychoticism scorers experiencing less anxiety than low Psychoticism scorers. Although counterintuitive, the wounding and death of the player's own character may increase some aspect of positive emotion. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effects of the rate of computer-mediated speech on emotion-related subjective and physiological responses

In this paper, we describe the results of a psychophysiological study on user's judgements on, and physiological responses to, audio news, which were presented on computer with a fast and slow reading rate. Several effects of condition, age, gender, level of education and level of computer-user experience on the evaluation of the understandability, valence, arousal and interest of the news, as well as on electrodermal and facial muscle activity were found. For example, the fast news was judged as more arousing, but the slow news as more understandable. The younger subjects judged the fast news as more positive and interesting, whereas the opposite was true for older subjects. The results have several methodological and practical implications on presenting and studying speech information in computer systems, such as speech interfaces and news services, given the possibilities afforded by modern technology to present multimodal information effectively and adapt the information and/or interfaces to fit the characteristics of the user (e.g. age).     

Comparing speakers versus headphones in listening to news from a computer – individual differences and psychophysiological responses

When audio is listened with speakers, the sound comes from a distance. With headphones, the surrounds are more isolated and the sound comes closer to the listener, and may thus create a more intimate and immersive listening experience. We examined the emotion-related subjective and psychophysiological responses elicited when listening news from a computer with speakers versus headphones, and the individual differences in these responses. Self-reported preference, valence, arousal, and understandability of the news, as well as electrodermal activity (EDA), pulse transit time (PTT), respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), and facial electromyography (EMG), were measured.     

Extracting relevance and affect information from physiological text annotation

We present physiological text annotation, which refers to the practice of associating physiological responses to text content in order to infer characteristics of the user information needs and affective responses. Text annotation is a laborious task, and implicit feedback has been studied as a way to collect annotations without requiring any explicit action from the user. Previous work has explored behavioral signals, such as clicks or dwell time to automatically infer annotations, and physiological signals have mostly been explored for image or video content. We report on two experiments in which physiological text annotation is studied first to (1) indicate perceived relevance and then to (2) indicate affective responses of the users. The first experiment tackles the user’s perception of relevance of an information item, which is fundamental towards revealing the user’s information needs. The second experiment is then aimed at revealing the user’s affective responses towards a -relevant- text document. Results show that physiological user signals are associated with relevance and affect. In particular, electrodermal activity was found to be different when users read relevant content than when they read irrelevant content and was found to be lower when reading texts with negative emotional content than when reading texts with neutral content. Together, the experiments show that physiological text annotation can provide valuable implicit inputs for personalized systems. We discuss how our findings help design personalized systems that can annotate digital content using human physiology without the need for any explicit user interaction.     

Aesthetic images modulate emotional responses to reading news messages on a small screen: A psychophysiological investigation

Abstract pictures, such as artistic drawings, may evoke subtle emotions in their observers via aesthetic experiences. We examined among 44 participants the emotional responses as measured by facial electromyography (EMG) to aesthetic background images that varied on the emotional valence (unpleasant to pleasant) and arousal (calming to exciting) dimensions and were presented both separately and as background images for news messages. Effects of image arousal on free recall of news messages were also examined. A priori pleasant compared to unpleasant images were associated with higher orbicularis oculi EMG responses, both when presented alone and when presented as news message backgrounds. Analyses based on the participants' subjective pleasantness ratings also showed greater corrugator supercilii EMG activity for unpleasant compared to pleasant images. High-arousal as compared to low-arousal images improved recall for the superimposed news messages. In contrast, recall was not affected by a priori image valence or subjective pleasantness ratings. The results demonstrate that abstract images can be used to evoke emotional responses in the viewers that persist even when unrelated messages are superimposed on them. Similarly, high-arousal images can be used to enhance memory for superimposed textual messages.