Audience effects: what can they tell us about social neuroscience, theory of mind and autism?

Hamilton, Antonia F. de C.; Lind, Frida

doi:10.1007/s40167-016-0044-5

Cited by 74 publications

(72 citation statements)

References 89 publications

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“…Eye contact was the only condition that promoted infant gaze following, and it was the only condition in which the HR increased from the baseline. Prior research has demonstrated that EC elevates physiological arousal [14] and enhances social cognitive processes [16,17]. Our study results can suggest that, in the context of gaze following, eye contact may elevate infant physiological arousal and induce gaze following as output.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 58%

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Physiological arousal predicts gaze following in infants

Ishikawa

Itakura

2019

Proc. R. Soc. B.

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According to the natural pedagogy theory, infant gaze following is based on an understanding of the communicative intent of specific ostensive cues. However, it has remained unclear how eye contact affects this understanding and why it induces gaze following behaviour. In this study, we examined infant arousal in different gaze following contexts and whether arousal levels during eye contact predict gaze following. Twenty-five infants, ages 9–10 months participated in this study. They watched a video of an actress gazing towards one of two objects and then either looking directly into the camera to make eye contact or not showing any communicative intent. We found that eye contact led to an elevation in the infants' heart rates (HRs) and that HR during eye contact was predictive of later gaze following. Furthermore, increases in HR predicted gaze following whether it was accompanied by communicative cues or not. These findings suggest that infant gaze following behaviour is associated with both communicative cues and physiological arousal.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 58%

“…Increased arousal influences the perceptual and cognitive processes dealing with social stimuli [13]. For example, eye contact elevates physiological arousal [14,15], affecting such social cognitive processes as face perception [16] and mentalizing [17].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Physiological arousal predicts gaze following in infants

Ishikawa

Itakura

2019

Proc. R. Soc. B.

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“…The idea here is that possessing a generative model that can distinguish between self and another is necessary for self-consciousness. As noted by one of my reviewers, this sort of generative model underwrites theory of mind and mentalizing; e.g., (Buckner and Carroll, 2007 ; Palmer et al, 2015 ; Hamilton and Lind, 2016 ; Fotopoulou and Tsakiris, 2017a ). The (active inference) imperatives that underlie these generative models also speak to simulation theories of mind reading (Gallese and Goldman, 1998 ; Kilner et al, 2007 )—suggesting a formal link between self-consciousness and consciousness of others.…”

Section: Self and Othersmentioning

confidence: 93%

Am I Self-Conscious? (Or Does Self-Organization Entail Self-Consciousness?)

2018

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Is self-consciousness necessary for consciousness? The answer is yes. So there you have it—the answer is yes. This was my response to a question I was asked to address in a recent AEON piece (https://aeon.co/essays/consciousness-is-not-a-thing-but-a-process-of-inference). What follows is based upon the notes for that essay, with a special focus on self-organization, self-evidencing and self-modeling. I will try to substantiate my (polemic) answer from the perspective of a physicist. In brief, the argument goes as follows: if we want to talk about creatures, like ourselves, then we have to identify the characteristic behaviors they must exhibit. This is fairly easy to do by noting that living systems return to a set of attracting states time and time again. Mathematically, this implies the existence of a Lyapunov function that turns out to be model evidence (i.e., self-evidence) in Bayesian statistics or surprise (i.e., self-information) in information theory. This means that all biological processes can be construed as performing some form of inference, from evolution through to conscious processing. If this is the case, at what point do we invoke consciousness? The proposal on offer here is that the mind comes into being when self-evidencing has a temporal thickness or counterfactual depth, which grounds inferences about the consequences of my action. On this view, consciousness is nothing more than inference about my future; namely, the self-evidencing consequences of what I could do.

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“…Together with facial expressions and body gestures, gaze cues are a rich source of non-verbal information to decode the intentions and internal states of others during social interactions 7 . Establishing direct gaze may signal social interest and intention to engage with the perceiver 8 , but it can also generate the feeling of being observed, an effect thought to promote prosocial behaviour 9 . Moreover, gaze is important for social referencing, as it shifts the attentional focus toward the gaze direction and elicits joint attention 10 .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Conditional effects of gaze on automatic imitation: the role of autistic traits

Trilla

Wnendt

Dziobek

2020

Sci Rep

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Establishing direct gaze has been shown to enhance the tendency to automatically imitate the other person’s actions, an effect that seems to be reduced in autism. Most previous studies, however, used experimental tasks that may have confounded the measurement of automatic imitation with spatial compatibility effects. This calls into question whether gaze cues regulate automatic imitation, or instead affect domain-general processes of response inhibition. Using a task that disentangled imitative from spatial compatibility effects, the current study re-examined the role of autistic traits on the modulation of automatic imitation by direct and averted gaze cues. While our results do not provide evidence for an overall significant influence of gaze on neither automatic imitation nor spatial compatibility, autistic traits were predictive of a reduced inhibition of imitative behaviour following averted gaze. Nonetheless, exploratory analyses suggested that the observed modulation by autistic traits may actually be better explained by the effects of concomitant social anxiety symptoms. In addition, the ethnicity of the imitated agent was identified as another potential modulator of the gaze effects on automatic imitation. Overall, our findings highlight the contextual nature of automatic imitation, but call for a reconsideration of the role of gaze on imitative behaviour.

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Audience effects: what can they tell us about social neuroscience, theory of mind and autism?

Cited by 74 publications

References 89 publications

Physiological arousal predicts gaze following in infants

Physiological arousal predicts gaze following in infants

Am I Self-Conscious? (Or Does Self-Organization Entail Self-Consciousness?)

Conditional effects of gaze on automatic imitation: the role of autistic traits

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