The effects of self-involvement on attention, arousal, and facial expression during social interaction with virtual others: A psychophysiological study

Mojzisch, Andreas; Schilbach, Leonhard; Helmert, Jens R.; Pannasch, Sebastian; Velichkovsky, Boris M.; Vogeley, Kai

doi:10.1080/17470910600985621

Cited by 76 publications

(74 citation statements)

References 43 publications

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“…However, our male participants did not show superior performance for a male's storytelling overall, but only when the gaze was direct. There is some evidence that motor resonance to facial expressions as measured by facial electromyography is stronger in the context of direct vs. averted gaze (Schrammel, Pannasch, Graupner, Mojzisch, & Velichkovsky, 2009;Soussignan et al, 2013) although this is not a consistent finding (see Mojzisch et al, 2006). In addition, in a brain imaging study, no effect of head and gaze direction was observed on the mirror neuron system activation (Schulte-Rüther, Markowitsch, Fink, & Piefke, 2007).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 91%

Learning under your gaze: the mediating role of affective arousal between perceived direct gaze and memory performance

Helminen

Pasanen

Hietanen

2015

Psychological Research

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Previous studies have shown that cognitive performance can be affected by the presence of an observer and self-directed gaze. We investigated whether the effect of gaze direction (direct vs. downcast) on verbal memory is mediated by autonomic arousal. Male participants responded with enhanced affective arousal to both male and female storytellers' direct gaze which, according to a path analysis, was negatively associated with the performance. On the other hand, parallel to this arousal-mediated effect, males' performance was affected by another process impacting the performance positively and suggested to be related to effort allocation on the task. The effect of this process was observed only when the storyteller was a male. The participants remembered more details from a story told by a male with a direct vs. downcast gaze. The effect of gaze direction on performance was the opposite for female storytellers, which was explained by the arousal-mediated process. Surprisingly, these results were restricted to male participants only and no effects of gaze were observed among female participants. We also investigated whether the participants' belief of being seen or not (through an electronic window) by the storyteller influenced the memory and arousal, but this manipulation had no effect on the results.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 91%

Learning under your gaze: the mediating role of affective arousal between perceived direct gaze and memory performance

Helminen

Pasanen

Hietanen

2015

Psychological Research

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“…Note, however, that participants who did not believe that the avatar was controlled by another human were excluded from study I and not invited to study II. In addition, previous investigations demonstrate that using avatars is an adequate tool to study the processing of facebased social stimuli (25,54). Moreover, although JA processing represents an elegant tool to investigate basic social interaction behavior as represented by gaze contact, it cannot cover all facets of social interaction behavior.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Functional changes of the reward system underlie blunted response to social gaze in cocaine users

Preller

Herdener

Schilbach

et al. 2014

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Social interaction deficits in drug users likely impede treatment, increase the burden of the affected families, and consequently contribute to the high costs for society associated with addiction. Despite its significance, the neural basis of altered social interaction in drug users is currently unknown. Therefore, we investigated basal social gaze behavior in cocaine users by applying behavioral, psychophysiological, and functional brain-imaging methods. In study I, 80 regular cocaine users and 63 healthy controls completed an interactive paradigm in which the participants' gaze was recorded by an eye-tracking device that controlled the gaze of an anthropomorphic virtual character. Valence ratings of different eye-contact conditions revealed that cocaine users show diminished emotional engagement in social interaction, which was also supported by reduced pupil responses. Study II investigated the neural underpinnings of changes in social reward processing observed in study I. Sixteen cocaine users and 16 controls completed a similar interaction paradigm as used in study I while undergoing functional magnetic resonance imaging. In response to social interaction, cocaine users displayed decreased activation of the medial orbitofrontal cortex, a key region of reward processing. Moreover, blunted activation of the medial orbitofrontal cortex was significantly correlated with a decreased social network size, reflecting problems in real-life social behavior because of reduced social reward. In conclusion, basic social interaction deficits in cocaine users as observed here may arise from altered social reward processing. Consequently, these results point to the importance of reinstatement of social reward in the treatment of stimulant addiction. joint attention | reinforcement | social cognition | dopamine | social functioning

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“…That is, likeable people look good, are friendly, and are useful, and all three contribute to an overall sense of attraction. Previous research on virtual characters has identified a number of other potentially important factors, including personality (Arellano, Verona & Perales, 2008), politeness and impoliteness (Campano & Sabouret, 2009), rapport (Gratch, Wang, Gerten, Fast & Duffy, 2007), directional attention (Mojzisch, Schilbach, Helmert, Pannasch, Velichovsky & Vogeley, 2006), the social dynamics of display (Ochs & Prendinger, 2010), and similarity/homophily (Jones, Pelham, Carvallo & Mirenberg, 2004). …”

Section: Real Feelings For Virtual People: Emotional Attachments and mentioning

confidence: 99%

Real feelings for virtual people: Emotional attachments and interpersonal attraction in video games.

Coulson

Barnett

Ferguson

et al. 2012

Psychology of Popular Media Culture

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Factors which may affect how people become attracted to virtual characters were explored in an online survey of players of a recent video role-playing game. Seventy-four participants (33 male) completed a series of questionnaires assessing their personality, motivations for game play, and feelings towards the ten non-player characters (NPCs) with whom they had potentially experienced extensive interactions within the game world. Results suggest that people form real and authentic emotional attachments to virtual characters, and that these arise from a complex blend of the players' personality and motivation, and the virtual characters' levels of physical attraction, friendliness (or hostility) and general usefulness within the game context. Implications of these findings, and suggestions for future research, are discussed.

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The effects of self-involvement on attention, arousal, and facial expression during social interaction with virtual others: A psychophysiological study

Cited by 76 publications

References 43 publications

Learning under your gaze: the mediating role of affective arousal between perceived direct gaze and memory performance

Learning under your gaze: the mediating role of affective arousal between perceived direct gaze and memory performance

Functional changes of the reward system underlie blunted response to social gaze in cocaine users

Real feelings for virtual people: Emotional attachments and interpersonal attraction in video games.

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