Looking at pictures: Affective, facial, visceral, and behavioral reactions

[[Lang, Peter]]

Looking at pictures: Affective, facial, visceral, and behavioral reactions

Annotations

(22/10/2023, 13:27:28 )

“Colored photographic pictures that varied widely across the affective dimensions of valence (pleasant-unpleasant) and arousal (excited-calm) were each viewed for a 6-s period while facial electromyographic (zygomatic and corrugator muscle activity) and visceral (heart rate and skin conductance) reactions were measured. Judgments relating to pleasure, arousal, interest, and emotional state were measured, as was choice viewing time. Significant covariation was obtained between (a) facial expression and affective valence judgments and (b) skin conductance magnitude and arousal ratings.” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 261)

“Interest ratings and viewing time were also associated with arousal. Although differences due to the subject’s gender and cognitive style were obtained, affective responses were largely independent of the personality factors investigated.” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 261)

“Experitnental events were controlled by PDP 11/23 and Apple lie microcomputers. Valence and arousal ratings were obtained usitig the Self-Assessment Manikin (SAM; Lang, 1980), an animated interactive computer display.’ The SAM display (0-29 scale) was located 1.6 m in tront of the subject, below the projection screen. Slide duration (6 s)” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 263)

“The SAM correlates well with Mehrabian and Russell’s (1974) semantic differential study of affective texts, and its char,‘»cteristics have been de.scribed elsewhere (Hodes. Cook, & Lang, 1985; Lang, 1980).” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 263)

“For each subject, pictures were ranked along each SAM dimension (valence, arousal) from low (1) to high (21), ba.sed on each subject’s ratings.” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 264)

“Each subject’s ratings-physiology correlations were categorized as either exceeding significance (\r\ > .37; df = 19, onetailed p < .05) or not.” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 264) One tailed! And correlation is not very high

“Valence and arousal ratings for this new picture set were linearly independent, r = —.05 and similar to the correlation of mean valence and arousal judgments in the norinative group sample, r = - . 1 0 . However, increases in both pleasantness and unpleasantness were associated with greater arousal (quadratic r = .43, p < .05) (Figure 1).” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 264) Ähnlicher V-förmiger ZH

“Skin conductance response. Figure 2 (lower left panel) presents the covariation of electrodermal response with arousal judgments. As predicted, skin conductance response increased monotonically with ranked arousal, linear F(l,60) = 53.08, dimensional /• = .81. Seventy-seven percent of subjects showed positive conductance/arousal correlations; for 33%, the relationship was significant (Figure 3, right panel). This arousal/conductance association was even stronger than that reported by Greenwald et al. (1989; dimensional r = .67), with a similar prevalence among subjects. Unlike the pilot sample, however, conductance also seemed to increase with unpleasantness, F(l,60) = 19.31, dimensional /•= -.52;” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 265)

!400

“However, skin conductance responses were strongly related to judged arousal” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 269)

“In an analysis including all measures, two factors were clearly defined: (a) an affective Valence factor based on facial muscle responses, heart rate, and pleasantness judgments, and (b) an Arousal factor, consisting of skin conductance response, viewing time, and judgments of interest and arousal.” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 269)

“The results show that looking at pictures prompts similar affective reports across technical variants of the SAM rating measure (i.e., computerized or pencil-paper version) and induces reliable psychophysiologicai responses across different .samples of subjects. Identical patterns of covariation between judgments and response were obtained as in Greenwald et al. (1989), and a subset of 11 pictures u.sed in both studies was found to elicit reliable affective ratings and facial muscle responses. Although somewhat lower, reliability coefficients for visceral reactions in the replication set (especially skin conductance) were substantial. All of these affective measures provide stable estimates of picture response.” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 269)

“For nonfearful subjects, viewing pictures is an aesthetic task, and there appears to be a close a.ssociation between attention and etnotion, such that more arousing stimuli are more intensely perceived. Bradley et al. (1992) recently determined that the affective intensity of a picture percept determines its memorability. Using lAPS picture materials, Bradley et al. showed that memory was better for pictures rated as highly arousing, irrespective of emotional valence.” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 270)

“This effect is consistent with the findings of Gold and McGaugh (1975), who experimentally manipulated brain arousal level in animal subjects (by chemical or electrical intervention) and demonstrated better retention of training stimuli with moderate arou.sal increa.ses. Interestingly, these same researchers have also ob.served poor memory when very high levels of arousal are induced, which is consistent with the psychophysiological notion oi stimulus rejection (Lacey & Lacey, 1970” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 270)

“Overall, these results demonstrate that facial mu.scle change, like heart rate, is not always a simple function of valence (nor, by implication, of the underlying motivational dimensions)” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 270)

“Recent re.search (Lang et al., 1990, 1992) suggests that another somatic measure may better serve this role. When brief startle stimuli are presented unpredictably during picture viewing (or imagery), magnitude of the blink reflex varies linearly with affective valence: larger blinks are obtained for unpleasant, relative to pleasant, stimuli.” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 270)

“The mo.st reliable individual differences in affective response to pictures were found for gender. Significantly more women than men showed concordance between valence judgments and facial action (both corrugator and zygomatic tension). This result is consistent with previously observed gender differences in facial action during emotional imagery (Schwartz et al., 1980)” (Lang et al., 1993, p. 270)