every-juan

[every-juan]

A Matter of Taste (and other stories)

When we consume something, we often describe it using the following tastes: sweet, sour, salty, bitter, and umami (although we’d probably be hard-pressed to find a person who uses umami in daily conversation). But when we describe something as being sweet, for example, how certain are we that we are describing the taste alone, as defined by the simple stimulation on our tongue? We know of things that smell sweet. We see things that look sweet. If "sweet" is something we use to describe not only things we eat but also things we see and smell, then surely the entire perception of sweetness does not depend on one sensory modality alone. This is the premise of a study this article shall proceed to summarize.

Lots of researchers in the past have studied the effects of color on taste perception, particularly the perception of sweetness. Roth, Radle, Gifford and Clydesdale, and Dubose, Cardello and Maller have conducted studies in 1988 and 1980, respectively, that shows taste intensity and color intensity are directly proportional, meaning that if a certain foodstuff seems more intensely colored, the more people will think it tastes strongly. Johnson and Clydesdale’s 1982 study then showed that if a sweet-tasting solution is more intensely colored, people seem to perceive it as sweeter than it actually is. From this, you’d think that color enhances sweetness, right? However, Strugnell’s 1997 study compared different colors- red, blue, green and yellow- to a colorless solution and obtained the following result: only red solutions were deemed as sweet as colorless solutions. Therefore, enhancing sweetness needs to employ a particular color, and not just any color. From this, we, the researchers, decided to expound on the aforementioned studies by comparing a colorless solution to 2 levels of red liquid solutions. Strugnell says a colorless solution is deemed as sweet as a red solution. But which shade of red, exactly? Is it equal to all shades of red? That is the rationale behind the color conditions we have selected. Our hypothesis was that the “intense red” color condition would be deemed as sweetest.

Odor is a little more complicated than colors. Although humans can name almost a thousand colors, researchers can opt to use just the basic colors in studies. However, every odor has a particular odor profile, and there is yet to be a consensus whether there are actually basic odor profiles. However, Castro, Ramanathan and Chennubhotla (2013) seem to think that we can indeed group odors into 10 categories: Fragrant, Fruity, Citrus, Woody and Resinous, Chemical, Sweet, Minty, Toasted and Nutty, Pungent, and Decayed. We decided to base our choice of a sweet-smelling scent on this study, which gives examples of odors under each category. We opted for vanilla, which is a fairly well-known scent and is easily bought in stores. We used two odor intensities compared to an odorless control, in keeping with the color conditions. Our hypothesis that the concentrated odor condition (in which vanilla, without being mixed in water, is administered) will enhance the solution’s sweetness the most is based on studies done by Cliff and Noble (1990) and Lavin and Lawless (1998).

After pretests to smooth out the intricacies of the actual experiment, we proceeded with the study, in which participants were randomly assigned to one of the 9 conditions in the experiment. After the experiment proper, which lasted for a little less than two weeks, the data was collated and analyzed. Results were quite surprising, to say the least. All of our hypotheses were rejected! First of all, results indicated that it was the colorless condition that yielded the highest sweetness ratings (although even then it didn’t exceed a “slightly sweet” rating), and people also rated the intensely colored liquid as being the highest in terms of bitterness (we included other tastes as a way to make sure the participants aren’t biased in answering the sweetness scale). Second of all, the odor did not affect sweetness significantly. However, an odorless condition did lead to the highest perception of bitterness. Lastly, the interaction of color and odor did not affect sweetness perception and even perception of any of the other basic tastes significantly.

All in all, the results of our study seem to contradict the cumulative research on the effects of color and odor on taste perception so far. A lot of factors do come into play, especially the lack of proper equipment and even a proper laboratory in which we could conduct our experiments. However, we do believe that our study has contributed to the dynamic discussion of multiple sensory modalities and their complex interactions to produce perceptions of the physical world.

This article is a summary of the 2014 study “Perceived Sweetness as a Function of Odor and Color” done in partial fulfillment of the requirements in Psych 135, a class on Sensation and Perception. The study was conducted by: Lavinia Lyka Lopez, Ma. Joyce Macaraig, Jireh Christi Jae Magayanes, Dana Esperanza Pancho and Gabrielle Tiongson. For more information on the study, you may contact us through this blog.

References:

Castro J.B., Ramanathan A., & Chennubhotla C.S., (2013) Categorical Dimensions of Human Odor Descriptor Space Revealed by Non-Negative Matrix Factorization. PLoS ONE 8(9): e73289. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0073289

Cliff, M., & Noble, A. (1990). Time-intensity evaluation of sweetness and fruitiness and their interaction in a model solution. Journal of Food Science, 55(2), 450–454. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2621.1990.tb06784.x

DuBose C., Cardello, A. & Maller O. (1980). Effects of colorants and flavorants on identification, perceived flavor intensity, and hedonic quality of fruit-flavored beverages and cake. Journal of Food Science, 45:1393-1399, 1415

Johnson, J. & Clydesdale, F.M. (1982). Perceived sweetness and redness in colored sucrose solutions. Journal of Food Science, 47:747-752

Lavin, J., & Lawless, H. (1998). Effects of color and odor on judgments of sweetness among children and adults. Food Quality and Preference, 9(4), 283 - 2892. doi: 0950-329319f81 9.00 0.00

Roth, H., Radle L., Gifford, S., & Clydesdale, F. (1988). Psychological relationships between perceived sweetness and color in lemon- and lime-flavored drinks. Journal of Food Science, 53:1116-1119

Strugnell, S. (1997). Colour and its role in sweetness perception. Appetite, 28, 85.“The smell of commerce: how companies use scents to sell their products.” (2011). Retrieved from http://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/advertising/the-smell-of-commerce-how-companies-use-scents-to-sell-their-products-2338142.html.

Image from: http://www.sheknows.com

Psych 135's coolest kids. JK

[every-juan]

#foodporn #foodtrip #gastropost

All the love for food.

Tell me what you eat, and I’ll tell you who you are.

Ever heard of this saying?

No, I’m pretty sure you haven’t.

Because

I made that up (haha).

But maybe you’ve read some articles about Dr. Alan Hirsch’s studies on food personality. He may be someone who can actually tell you who you are if you tell him what you eat. Take a look at this:

Ice Cream Personality – a more recent study using Baskin-Robbins ice cream is now also in circulation

Snack Food Personality

Fruit Personality

In order to arrive at these conclusions, Dr. Alan Hirsch and his team over at the Smell and Taste Treatment and Research Foundation, Ltd. conducted a series of correlational studies using surveys and personality tests such as Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-II, Million Clinical Multiaxial Inventory-II, Beck Depression Inventory, and the Zung Depression Scale.

The idea of food as windows to the soul didn’t come without criticism though. A lot were like “what the f*ck, if I eat pretzel, I’m a flirt?”

Even fellow researchers find Dr. Hirsch’s studies too far-fetched and maybe a bit goofy. But, is it really harder to believe that food, rather than random inkblots, can reveal much about one’s personality? Dr. Hirsch says that it may be more logical to pair food and personality together because anatomically – the emotional and food processing area in the brain are both part of the limbic system – and developmentally – personality develops during about the same time as food preferences, which would be at ages 0-7 – both are somehow interrelated.

Though you might be skeptical as to the reliability and validity of these studies, they’re still some fun food for thought.

References:

Mason, R., & Hirsch, A. R. (2005). Exploring the Potentials of Human Olfaction: Alternative & Complementary Therapies, 11(3), 135-140. doi:10.1089/act.2005.11.135

Taste in fruit reveals personality traits. (1995). Nutrition Health Review: The Consumer's Medical Journal, (73), 13.

Noonan, P. (1993). What does your pineapple preference say about you?. Omni, 15(9), 30.

Alperstein, E. (2000, March 29). Snack Food for Thought. Retrieved March 28, 2014, from Los Angeles Times: http://articles.latimes.com/2000/mar/29/news/cl-13645

Extra!

Maybe you want to know what your lip balm personality is.

Heck, too many of these personality tests going around.

Contributor: Elaiza Berame

[every-juan]

/ / H I D D E N / /

Subliminal messages – ever heard of it?

You probably have, you just did not know.

To put it simply, subliminal messages are hidden messages in pictures, in music, or in any media that appeal to your subconscious. Maybe examples will help you understand the concept better:

Interesting, isn’t it?

We think so, too, that’s why we decided to study it. Using priming, we tested if subliminal messaging does have an effect on people, particularly on their perception of products. Three made-up brands of water: “Electric Mix”, “Lightning Shake”, and “Thunder Whirl”, were the focus products for the experiment.

A lot of previous studies have already discounted the significance of subliminal messaging, so numerous measures were taken to afford the possible mistakes of our forerunners. Participants were tasked with a physical activity at the start of the experiment to induce thirst and therefore make them more susceptible to the water set-up. To pronounce thirst more, the participants were also shown a video with a desert scene as the background of a scrolling vignette. Two other set-ups, one of three brands of pens and another of three differently colored belts, were also employed to distract the participant from the real one. Each participant was assigned to one of three conditions, one as control, one with conscious priming, and the last one with unconscious priming, equivalent to subliminal messaging. Auditory subliminal messaging was used against visual priming. In order to test the effectiveness of subliminal messaging, participants were to rate the products, on a scale of 1 to 7, 7 being the highest, according to how likely they were to buy each. If subliminal messaging was effective, the participants should rate “Electric Mix” highly.

So how did it go? Turns out, previous studies were kinda right, subliminal messaging doesn’t really affect people. Our results showed that participants preferred “Lightning Shake” the most, and mostly because it sounded “cool”.

Still, subliminal messaging is a rather fascinating idea. Searching the wonderful world of the internet, one would find a lot pertaining to this concept. In recent times, particular interest on the use of subliminal messaging for positive thinking, besides other stuff, is emerging. Though not all have scientific evidence, they’re still worth noting. Here are some:

Develop a more positive outlook in life through subliminal messages.

How can I be happy? – Dr. John Schinnerer wants to help you.

Subliminal messaging can influence people in surprising ways – like moderating their political attitudes.

We did not prove anything about subliminal messaging, but I’m sure we got you all curious about it now.

Reference:

Vistal, G., Carpio, J., Largoza, M., Jabines, J., Berame, E. (2014). Electric Mix, Lightning Shake, and Thunder Whirl: The Effects of Conscious and Unconscious Priming on Consumer Behavior.

P.S. Did you think about this when you saw the title? #truefan #claps

[every-juan]

Magic tomatoes!

(This is a tomato.) The magic berry, otherwise known as the miracle fruit is as a glamorous charm for the gustatory senses. This average looking plant, with it's minuscule size and plain looking leaves seems like nothing out of the ordinary. That is, until you taste any sour item after and feel the taste transformed into the sweetest of the sweet. Mostly grown in Asia, with it's origins are from South America. Scientists have long discovered the protein at play here, naming it Miraculin, after it's seemingly miraculous properties. Inglett (1965) and his team of chemists, working in the International Minerals and Chemicals Corp. isolated the protein and published their findings in the Food Chemistry Journal. Scientific interest grew in the fruit and it's ability until a few decades later, when a certain pharmaceutical company tried and failed to get it through the FDA. When it was classified as a food additive and required more stringent screening, the support was largely dropped. This is unfortunate regarding what potential the magic fruit could have provided. We've not just talking about flavor parties here or sweeter beers. Although, those are important. We're also talking about the possibility for those afflicted with diabetes to taste sweet foods again without having to deal with the metallic aftertastes commonly associated with artificial sweeteners. Cancer patients, those with high blood sugar, and literally anyone who may have an aversion to sugar and it's natural properties may find some relief with the miracle fruit. Alas, if we want to get some of it, it will have to be by either ordering them online or growing them ourselves. not to mention that the fruit doesn't hold very well and naturally perishes after 1-2 days. If only there was some way that we could do to solve this! Except that recently, scientist just have. By isolating the gene creating the protein for miraculin, scientists have been able to transplant it into tomatoes. Genetic modification has allowed the production of sweet altering, miracle tomatoes! Technically the tomato is a berry-type fruit so we could still call it miracle berry. however, this allows many people more familiar and comfortable with the red fruit to enjoy the benefits of the original. Not to mention, it could make food preparation a lot easier as well. Instead of having to grind berries into a mashy pulp or pulverize some miraculin tablets, you can simply add tomatoes as usual. Pizza with beer never sounded more perfect or tasted any sweeter. Sourced from: http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/jf60139a026 http://altmedicine.about.com/od/herbsupplementguide/fl/Miracle- Fruit.htm Inglett, G.E., Dowling, B., Albrecht, J.J., Hoglan, F.A. (1965) Taste Modifiers, Taste-Modifying Proerties of Miracle Fruit (Synsepalum Dulcificum) j.Agric. Food Chem. 13, 284-287 -Justin Jabines

[every-juan]

Ahihihi, TICKLY!

How come if another person tickles us, we either twitch uncontrollably or roar in laughter (or in pain, for others), but if we do the same thing to ourselves, it's boring – almost as if there were nothing 'tickly' about it at all? I find this baffling because first, we're essentially doing the same thing, so how come it produces different sensations? Second, it reminds us that we could not bring ourselves into auto-laugh, which is quite sad, if you ask me, especially when you're alone. Lastly, it just doesn't make any sense and sometimes, for some people, when things don't make sense, they find it annoying. Scientists, for example, especially the hard-core ones, strike me as the kind that constantly feels annoyed when they find themselves in a state of unknowing and their insatiable curiosity propels them to find the answers, if only to relieve themselves from that unpleasant state hehe. :) Kidding aside, scientists tried to find out why self-tickling doesn't work, and here's why: it looks like it's because of the cerebellum (Blakemore, Wolpert & Firth, 1998). You know, the part of the brain that functions for balance, movement and coordination as per our traditional textbooks. Blakemore & co-workers (1998) discovered this when they observed participants' brain activity using fMRI and asked for their self-report of ticklish sensations as they were either instructed to tickle themselves or had an experimenter tickle them. (For the record, a foam rod was used for both self-generated and externally generated conditions; no participant was touched by the experimenter when tickled.) Those who self-tickled reported feeling less ticklish, showed less somatosensory cortex activity and was associated with more cerebellar activity, while those who were tickled by the experimenter reported significantly feeling more ticklish, showed more somatosensory cortex activity and was associated with less cerebellar activity. According to Blakemore & others (1998) it would seem that if the tickle sensation was self-generated, the cerebellum somehow predicted how it will feel like based on the sequence of movements associated with it, and therefore cancels the corresponding sensory response so you feel less tickly. So it turns out that when you self-tickle, by virtue of its nature as being self-generated, your cerebellum -- whose function is to monitor your own movement -- is able to anticipate the sensations that you will perceive, and hence, the somatosensory cortex is less activated and you don't feel so tickly; unlike when another person is tickling you, then there's the element of uncertainty that comes with it, and because the sensations are being externally generated, the somatosensory cortex "doesn't know what's coming", so to speak, hence the significantly heightened tickle sensations. Personally, I never would have thought the brain structure with a rather boring textbook definition ("for balance, movement and coordination") has to do with tickle sensations. Ain't that funny?

Ahihihi! What can you say about this cutie's cerebellar activity? (Photocredit: www.jokeroo.com) Reference: Blakemore, S. J., Wolpert, D. M., & Frith, C. D. (1998). Central cancellation of self-produced tickle sensation. Nature Neuroscience, 1(7), 635. -Gab Tiongson

[every-juan]

We Just Wanna Make the World Dance, Forget About the Price Tag (Or Not!): Price and Taste Perception

VERSUS

References: Plassmann, H., O’Doherty, J., Shiv, B., & Rangel, A. (2007). Marketing actions can modulate neural representations of experienced pleasantness.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 19, 430-1054. doi: 10.1073/pnas.0706929105 Supplementary References: Goldtein, E. Bruce (2010). Sensation and Perception, 8th Edition. California, USA: Wadsworth. Hawes, D., Grazioplene, R., & D'Ardenne, K. (2010, February 16). Does a price tag have a taste?. Retrieved from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evolved-primate/201002/does-price-tag-have-taste Trei, L., (2010, February 16). Price changes way people experience wine, study finds. Retrieved from http://news.stanford.edu/news/2008/january16/wine-011608.html Image References: http://news.stanford.edu/news/2008/january16/wine-011608.html http://dighaytodeath.blogspot.com/2011_03_01_archive.html http://edition.cnn.com/2010/LIVING/04/09/starbucks.trivia/ http://www.emeraldinsight.com/books.htm?chapterid=1775323&show=html Blog Entry by: Macaraig, Ma. Joyce B.

[every-juan]

To Smoke or Not To Smoke

A lot of people say that smoking cessation makes a person fat because all of a sudden, food tastes so much better than it did before stopping cigarette use. Why is that? Is taste linked with nicotine consumption? Let’s explore! My maternal grandfather was a heavy smoker for almost 2 decades until he stopped in the 1980s. Since then, he has developed a passionate affair with anything sweet. He used to consume several bottles of Pop Cola every day and would usually end his day in front of the television eating Choc Nut. Later on, he was diagnosed with Diabetes and from that moment on, he can never indulge in the produce of the candied paradise. This led me to wonder how smoking affects how we taste. Let us first establish the connection between smoking and tasting. In perhaps one of the earliest psychophysical researches on smoking and taste perception, Kurt, Perrin and Bronte-Steward (1961) argue that nicotine “fatigues the mechanisms for the perception of bitterness”. Interestingly, however, it seems mostly likely that nicotine does not affect our sweet, salty and sour taste perceptions. In other words nicotine sort of block human’s taste receptors for only bitter compounds. Nicotine is the substance inside cigarettes that makes it addicting and in theory (I’ve never tries smoking before), it tastes bitter. Now, some studies tell us that if you are less capable of tasting bitter compounds, you are more likely a candidate for chain smoking! For example, a study conducted by Enoch, Harris and Goldman (2001) in American Indian participants reveal that non-smokers and those who smoke occasional are “significantly more likely to have stronger perceptions of bitterness than established smokers”. In exploring this, they used PTC (short for phenylthiocarbamide), a bitter substance that some people cannot perceive due to the lack of receptors for tasting it. Other studies used another substance called PROP (which stands for 6-n-propylthiouracil) because sensitivity to it may be related to the perception of sweetness. Earlier we have mentioned that sweetness perception is not affected by nicotine. However, a study by Pepino and Mennella (2007) on women tells us that “smokers had significantly higher sucrose detection thresholds than never smokers”. Because their study involves looking at the threshold of perceiving sucrose, the authors are saying that even though the difference between women heavily exposed to nicotine and women who are not exposed to it are not significant, their data reveals a trend: women smokers need higher amounts of sucrose in order to perceive sweetness than non-smokers. In summary, we’ve seen a sample of the results on studies relating smoking with tasting. It is most likely that nicotine consumption affects our perceptions of bitter and sweet tastes. Now that we’ve seen how nicotine most likely affects how we taste, wouldn’t you rather choose to enjoy the tastes of food than the effects of nicotine?

- image from http://www.justkickitnow.com/ References: Enoch, M., Harris, C. R., & Goldman, D. (2001). Does reduced sensitivity to bitter taste increase the risk of becoming nicotine addicted? Addictive Behavior, 26, 399 – 404. Retrieved from http://bioserv.fiu.edu/~biolab/labs/genetics/genetics%202009/PTC%20sources%20and%20materials/Does%20a%20reduced%20sensitivity%20to%20bitter%20taste%20increase%20the%20risk.pdf Kurt, L. H., Perrin, M. J., & Bronte-Stewart, B. (1961). Taste perception in smokers and non-smokers. British Medical Journal. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1953268/pdf/brmedj02880-0036.pdf?ev=pub_ext_btn_xdl Pepino, M. & Mennella, J. A. (2007). Effects of cigarette smoking and family history of alcoholism on sweet taste perception and food cravings in women. Alcohol Clin Exp Res, 31(11), 1891 – 1899. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2268904/pdf/nihms41449.pdf Contributor: Jan Jacob B. Carpio

[every-juan]

La Douleur Exquise

(French: “the exquisite pain”)

She could’ve asked if he was infatuated with her, obsessed with her, in love with her, and it was yes to all. They’re all the same anyway, all unhealthy and sanity-draining when they’re unrequited. Love is nothing more than a pure word for obsessions to steady the idealistic romantics in this world, but it bleeds you dry just the same. Makes you vulnerable. Makes you crumble.

- The Advocate’s Handwriting (1)

Have you ever heard of the adage “it’s better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all”? Pretty easy to remember, but if you’ve ever been on the ‘losing’ side of love then you know sometimes one can feel it’s better just to lose the capability of loving altogether. When you’ve “loved and lost”, you know how painful it can get. You know how your chest always seems to tighten whenever you remember the rejection; you know just how that tightness travels from your chest to the tips of your fingers and your stomach and your legs and in any other part of your being it can reach; you know the shortness of breath; you know the unbidden tears; you know how sometimes it’s hard to understand why they call it heartbreak when it seems your whole body is broken, too.

But why do we feel this way? Why is it that in the absence of any physical triggers, we feel actual pain? If emotions are intangible and abstract, why can we ascertain that heartbreak produces real, actual, physical pain? Well, to our minds, any social pain is practically the same as physical pain, both in its affective and sensory components. Jacquelyn Flaskerud from the University of California- Los Angeles, did a review of literature that showed evidences that heartbreak and physical pain are linked in the brain. In her review, she detailed an experiment wherein participants where shown pictures of people who have broken up with them or rejected them, then they underwent a task where they experienced noxious thermal stimulation. The experimenters found out using Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) that physical pain and heartbreak involved the same areas of the brain. Maybe that is why we feel actual pain during heartbreak- since the parts of the brain involved in actual sensation of pain become active, it makes everything hurt physically. And apparently, since physical pain and heartbreak seem to overlap, you can use treatments of physical pain to alleviate a broken heart! However, the effects are only temporary, and pain relievers are not really an advisable treatment for healing a broken heart. Nothing is, really, except maybe time. Then again, it takes an incredibly long time to get over a heartbreak compared to physical pain- and this is something evinced by researchers. When we think of an accident that caused us to bump our heads in the past, for example, we remember the pain we experienced at that time but the feeling is long gone. However, when remembering a particularly hard rejection or a case of love unrequited, you may relive the pain. I know that every single time, my chest tightens and I can’t breathe when I remember this guy I can never be with. I relive the pain every time. It happens, and no amount of Tylenol or any pain reliever can make that go away.

Perhaps physical pain and the pain of heartbreak are more intertwined in terms of the affective component. They’re both distressing and unpleasant. In the earlier experiment mentioned, wherein the participant is shown a picture of an ex-lover and experienced thermal stimulation, the participants reported equal levels of distress in both “pain-inducing” conditions. This goes to show that heartbreak is just as distressing as any physical pain. People tend to frown upon people suffering heartbreak because some think that it’s a shallow thing to be sad about, and that one needs to simply “get over it”. Well, at least now we know (and have evidence) that heartbreak causes significant distress and actual sensations of pain, and it’s not something that we should take lightly. Apparently, one can even die from it! The “broken heart syndrome” or stress cardiomyopathy, is a lethal heart condition induced by acute emotional distress. So heartbreak is indeed something we need to be wary about.

What can we get from all these? From this, we can see that love is trouble. It can cause a lot of hurt and a lot of pain, and it can actually exacerbate any other illnesses or physical pains we might have. Or we can choose to look at the bright side and get from all these that if love spurned causes so much distress, then love returned and love encouraged should produce enough happiness to lessen or even overshadow any physical pain we have. We can take from this that love is powerful, and if we can give it and receive it not in its negative form but in its positive form, then we’ll be alright.

References:

Flaskerud, J.H. (2011). Heartbreak and physical pain linked in brain. Issues in Mental Health Nursing, 32, 789-791.

Chen, Z., Williams, K. D., Fitness, J., & Newton, N. (2008). When hurt will not heal: Exploring the capacity to relive social and physical pain. Psychological Science, 19, 789–795.

DeWall, C. N., MacDonald, G., Webster, G. D., Masten, C. L., Baumeister, R. F., Powell, C., . . . Eisenberger, N. I. (2010). Tylenol reduces social pain: Behavioral and neural evidence. Psychological Science, 21, 931–937.

Written by: Jireh Christi Jae U. Magayanes who, sadly, knows a thing or two about heartbreak

(1) The Advocate's Handwriting is a fanfiction story set in the Harry Potter universe. If you're a fan of Harry Potter, fanfiction and extreme angst, you may access the story here: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/8010763/1/The-Advocate-s-Handwriting

[every-juan]

“Saan tayo kakain?” “Kahit saan.” “Anong gusto mong kainin?” “Kahit ano.” As Filipinos, we LOVE eating. Eating is not just for our sustenance, but it has become a social activity. We eat to celebrate, we eat to catch up with our friends, we eat to bond, we eat when we are stressed, we eat when there are special occasions, and we eat just about anytime and anywhere. Eating, or specifically flavor perception, is a multisensory experience. It involves sensory cues such as olfactory, gustatory, somatosensory, auditory, visual and trigeminal. But have you ever thought that non-edible components of eating and drinking can also affect flavor perception? The utensils, plates, glasses, menus, and the atmosphere affect our perception of flavor of the food that we eat. It is amazing to think that eating is not just all about the food, but it is all about the overall experience. First off, spoons made of different materials have different tastes. Different spoons with the same shape, size and weight are plated with either gold, silver, copper, tin, chrome, or stainless steel. Results show that gold and chrome spoons were rated as least metallic, least bitter, and least strong tasting while zinc and copper spoons were rated as most bitter, most metallic and significantly less sweet. The metallic taste of the spoons did not influence pleasantness ratings and in fact, certain metals can be used to enhance flavor. For example, zinc and copper spoons increase saltiness of food which is beneficial especially for people with restricted sodium diets. Food was also more pleasant if eaten using a heavier metallic spoon than a metallic-looking plastic spoon. For forks, people eat more when using smaller forks than using larger forks. But if the food is free, people eat more with larger utensils and less with smaller utensils. Next, even plates have an effect of flavor perception. Salty popcorn tastes sweeter when eaten from a blue or red bowl while sweet popcorn is saltier when eaten from a blue bowl. Strawberry-flavored mousse is more intense, sweeter and more liked when served on a white plate than on a black one. The different effects of color of plates on flavor perception may have been because of color contrast. Perceived intensity of the food’s flavor is influenced by its perceived color saturation, which is influenced by the saturation of the plate itself. The flavor perception may also be due to the attributed taste to certain colors. Red is typically attributed to sweetness while blue to saltiness. Size also affects food consumption. People with larger bowls tend to eat more than those with smaller bowls. The weight is also a factor. Yoghurt served in heavier bowls is rated as more intense, denser, more expensive and more liked. For the drinks, red wine is more liked when tasted from a blue wine glass than in a traditional clear wine glass. Different glass shapes release different amounts of volatile organic compounds from the wine’s surface and wine is directed to different parts of the tongue as a function of the shape of the glass. For soft drinks, soft drinks consumed from a “cold colored” blue glass is perceived to be more thirst quenching compared to a “warm colored” yellow glass. Isn’t it amazing to know that the objects we use everyday for eating affects the taste of the food we eat? Studies show that bottles, condiment containers, the atmosphere, and menu pricing and naming also affect flavor perception. Whether you’re a restaurateur, cook in a carinderia or even just at home, giving extra effort to how you serve your food contributes to a scrumptious meal. Reference: Spence, C., Harrar, V. & Fiszman-Piqueras, B. (2012). Assessing the impact of the tableware and other contextual variables on multisensory flavor perception. Retrieved from http://www.flavourjournal.com/content/1/1/7. By: Dana Pancho

[every-juan]

Love and Jealousy

It is so nice to be in love. You get to spend time with your significant other, show how much you love him/her, and have the chance to tell him/her everyday that he/she is the most important person to you and you cannot live without him/her. Being in love is the most wonderful feeling in the world.

But be careful because whenever you love someone, jealousy would always be in the corner. If you become too possessive of your partner, jealousy might take control over you. It will slowly destroy your relationship and leave you with nothing but despair and regret.

Enough with all the drama. Did you know that love and jealousy can influence taste perception?

Chan, Tong, Tan, and Koh (2013) conducted a study linking taste perception and emotions. According to the study, metaphors (e.g., “sweet love”) about jealousy and love associated with sourness, bitterness, and sweetness are prevalent in society and indicate that these emotions can affect perceptual taste judgments. Several experiments were conducted to find out if this was true. Studies 1A and 1B confirmed that these metaphors are vastly used. In the next experiments, participants made to feel love rated different tastants (bitter-sweet chocolates, sweet-sour candy, and distilled water) as sweeter than the participants who were made to feel jealous, happy, or neutral. The ratings of the participants who were made to feel jealous, happy, or neutral were not different. Jealousy was not associated with sourness and bitterness contrary to the implications of metaphors used in society. Results of this study indicate that emotions can affect basic perceptual judgments, but metaphors that pertain to the body do not automatically affect perceptual judgments the way they seem to.

The association of love and sweetness can be explained by the neural reward circuitry shared by happenings of being in love and perceiving sweetness (Chan, Tong, Tan, and Koh, 2013). The anterior cingulate cortex, a part of the brain associated with reward expectance, is stimulated when a person looks at pictures of his/her significant other and when taking in sugar. It is probable that when a person experiences love, the anterior cingulate cortex would trigger embodiments linked to sweetness, thereby producing sweetness sensations even if there is no input of real sweetness from an exterior source.

Everything is better when there is love. Food even tastes sweeter because of love. Don’t be afraid to love someone because what you will feel, experience, and even taste will be priceless.

Reference: Chan, K., Tong, E. W., Tan, D. H., & Koh, A. Q. (2013). What do love and jealousy taste like?. Emotion, 13(6), 1142-1149. doi:10.1037/a0033758 Reference for Images (from google): http://safersurgery.files.wordpress.com/2012/11/kristen-and-austen.png http://www.relationstips.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/Jealousy.jpg http://adrianblau.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/question-mark.jpg http://www.worldvision.com.au/Libraries/1_3_1_3_-What_is_the_real_cost_of_chocolate/1_3_1_3_1.jpg http://images4.alphacoders.com/191/191916.jpg http://www.mnn.com/sites/default/files/main_chanie_distilled_spring_water.jpg http://www.sutherlandsurvey.com/Images/Columns09_Images/ACC_and_PFC.jpg http://bios.weddingbee.com/pics/35509/Engagement_Pics/AA09_17.jpg By Lavinia Lyka Lopez

[every-juan]

Blog 4: I Smell Happy

In the top of your head I want you to give me a word when you see this phrase:

I get happy smelling ______

Croy and his colleagues did the same procedure in 2011 to 97 people. Cory also asked whether they could describe words that you can associate with other emotions such as anger, disgust, anxiety, surprise and sadness. Croy and his colleagues were skeptical at first for he felt that people would have a hard time associating things or words with smell. He even allowed them to leave some of the items blank if they don’t know how one emotions smells like. Tell me, how do you describe the smell of the picture below?

Frankly, it’s just simply adobo-smelling. For those who don’t know adobo, you can just say it is sautéed meat smelling. Goldstein states in his book that the problem with olfaction is that it does not have a unit or label of measure. Sight has wavelengths, sound has frequencies and pitch. Gustatory have the basic tastes such as bitter, sweet and sour. As for smell, there is practically none. Sure you can say that the chicken smells like protein, but the protein of other meats has a different smell as well and saying just protein does not give it justice. If just say that the adobo just smells like adobo, you would be neglecting the other scents that give off the smell of adobo as well such as the following ingredients:

Now, the bigger picture lies on how do these scents have to do with emotions? Croy and his colleagues managed to find a way on tackling these. He asked people to write what comes into mind when they saw the emotion and it’s smell association and certainly enough the participants where able to give an answer to most of the emotions. The experimenter had 7 categories from the answers of the participants. The first is nature which is described as everything inanimate such as the picture below.

The next 2 categories are plants and animals. The forth category is humans. This referred to anything associated with human behaviour or anything a human does such as a baby smiling or a person running.

The fifth category is culture. Croy states that “culture” is any product produced by man such as perfume or bags. The sixth category is death and waste. This was associated to garbage, compose or dead bodies. Included in this category is feces, manure and vomit. The last category is food. Who wouldn’t want to put food as a category. Just look at it.

Croy found out that people where able to give answers to most of the emotions, more specifically to happy and disgust. People gave answers of food, plants to happiness. Who wouldn’t be happy being in this scenery and actually smelling the horizon.

People also gave answers of death and waste for object about disgust. What smells disgusting are smells of feces and vomit. I would have to agree that it is disgusting. Generally, people tend to have more culture cues or man made object associated when it comes to smell and emotions. People think of happiness as your crush’s cologne or panic as the smell of burnt paper. Emotions are actually a big part of our smell and not just the molecules that contribute the smell.

But GV, how do these emotions and smell work? Glad you mentioned it and Goldstein has the answer. You see, all the smells that you sense will eventually go into a certain part of your brain called the amygdala. Just look at it.

The amygdala is the part of your brain that handles with your emotions and feelings. Happiness, sadness, joy, sorrow, all come from that small part called your amygdala. Smell and amygdala are close to one another as in really close. You can associate one smell with your amygdala as simple as sniff and I feel sad or happy or whatever emotions come into mind. Sometimes, the pairing maybe weird such as you like the smell of feet and it makes you happy because it is your dad’s feet or you hate the smell of a certain flower because it reminds you of your crush. All in all, the amygdala and other parts of your brain help you in your sensory experience with a certain smell.

You can even use this for your advantage. Let’s say you are having the best time of your life. What you do is bring a bottle of any scent you like and smell it during and after that best moment of your life. The next time you smell that scent you carry, you can’t help but be happy. This is the beauty of your brain and smell.

Although there is no precise measure of smell, at least there is a way to associate smells with emotions. So the next time you see your favourite food or you crush, don’t say I smell food or I smell my crush.. say “ I smell happy” instead. That way, everyone will get that what you smell is something happy. Just make sure that you tell others that and not you yourself smell "happy" :))

References:

Croy, I., Olgun, S., & Joraschky, P. (2011). Basic emotions elicited by odors and pictures. Emotion, 11(6), 1331.

Goldstein, E. (2013). Sensation and perception. Cengage Learning.

Godofredo Y. Vistal Jr.

All pictures came from google.

[every-juan]

He collapses beside her, arching his back slightly up to make way for an effusive sort of a laugh to quake out of him, and then it really really strikes him odd that he makes an effort to lower his hand near hers to enmesh her fingers with his, like the way his laughter crept up the back of his throat in a skulking manner— he reminds himself that this is an exchange not fortified with endeared vows lovers would put on their lips and touch each other with.

He retreats his hand just as fast, because he knows that a steal is as good as any steal and he'll be damned if he goes in to filch another one.

Touch is, perhaps, the most primitive of the senses, in a sense that it is the most straightforward. For infants, touch is a vital contributor to their personal growth, and it persists even in adulthood as a means of communicating, such as in comforting or in flirting. Reading emotions is synonymous to gauging out one’s, well, emotions based on his body language and facial expressions, and this has been the focus of many previous research studies, but the big question is— can the same be applied purely for tactile stimulation? Can touch really mediate emotions between two people? Two studies were conducted to determine if it is indeed true that people can express emotions via touch.

Hertenstein et. al (2006) looked into this phenomenon by testing unacquainted participants, and found that these strangers could correctly express at least the eight universal emotions— 4 of which are considered “negative”, and the other four, “positive”: fear, anger, disgust, sadness, happiness, gratitude, love, and sympathy through mere touches on the forearm. Recorded accuracy rates ranged from 50% to 70%, which is comparable to various data from literature concerning facial expressions and vocal affirmations. However, prosocial emotions (like surprise) nor self-focused ones (such as pride, envy, or embarrassment) were not found to be as accurately expressed through touch as the previous ones. This finding also implies that the tactile system is not any less complex or differentiated as signals from the face or voice.

How did this work? Hertenstein et. al (2006) staged the experiment in that the participants could freely convey these emotions however they deem fit through touching. However, the findings could also be seen as the participants merely conveying their intentions, not exactly their emotions.

To add to this tactile literature, a study conducted by Thompson and Hampton (2011) tested communication via touch among strangers and lovers, and compared the data acquired. The couples were mostly of heterosexual nature, and the strangers were paired in a same-sex manner. Not surprisingly, those who are romantically-involved with each other outperformed strangers, although the latter still fared well for most emotions. Those romantically-involved were, indeed, superior, especially when it comes to self-focused emotions.

Thompson and Hampton (2011) tried to account for the reason why romantically-involved partners have a higher accuracy. As seen in the footage of the experiment, romantic couples touched each other for a bit longer, but this didn’t explain the greater accuracy. Moreover, it seemed pretty clear that the strangers who were paired up were using almost the same styles of touching as the romantic couples, with only subtle differences. Or perhaps it really depends on the receiver of the touch on how to interpret these cues, especially if his/her relationship with his/her partner is of intimate nature?

Then again, how to interpret touch cues is also defined by culture, so it can be interpreted differently depending on the latter.

References:

Hertenstein, M. J., Holmes, R., McCullough, M., & Keltner, D. (2009). The communication of emotion via touch. Emotion, 9(4), 566.

Thompson, E., and Hampton, J. (2011). The effect of relationship status on communicating emotions through touch. Cognition and Emotion, 25 (2), 295-306 DOI: 10.1080/02699931.2010.492957

*I do not own any of the .gifs/stills. All standard disclaimers apply.

[Article by Marie Louise Emille M. Largoza]

[every-juan]

ikot-ikot lang

Ikot-ikot-ikot lang, ikot-ikot-ikot lang. Ikot-ikot lang, ikot-ikot-ikot… People in general seem to have quite a fascination for spinning objects (or just rotation in general). Take a look at these.

Leo diCaprio used it to get a grasp of reality. Rotation as a perceived motion takes place in everyday life. We see it everyday – the wheels of a jeepney, your watch ticking to the time, and many more. Sometimes things that are too common tend to escape our memory. Just now my mind became blank when I gathered my memory for everyday things that spin. Do we really remember our perception of motion? Gilden and Price (2000) conducted a study which involved six experiments about the patterns of flow – basically about how people perceive movement. Memory accuracy for motion direction was what the study was focused on. The researchers identified three basic patterns of flow: translation, looming (contraction-expansion), and rotation.

Experiment one through six focused on translation vs rotation, looming, combined motion (translation and rotation), dynamic occlusion and object permanence, revolution, perceptual completion (involves revolution and rotational common fate), respectively. The method for each experiment was quite similar except for some trivial changes. Participants were made to look at different moving stimuli twice per set. The first time was the study phase and the second was recognition memory test phase. Participants would either answer yes or no if they have seen the object shown currently from the first batch. The first experiment showed that there is a more sensitivity to translational motion that rotation. In the second experiment, it became apparent that change of place was a big factor in remembering an object’s motion. The third experiment was designed on the idea that motion patterns don’t usually occur simultaneously in real life. With this in mind, the researchers decided to see a significance of rotation paired with translation. It was found out that although these motions happen together, it was still possible that they may be analyzed separately. Also, people’s memories for translation are much better than that of rotation, even when these two occur together. For the fourth experiment, limitation in memory for rotation was evident whether the rotating object was occluded or not. The fifth experiment involved the topic of revolution. Revolution was considered a hybrid motion in that it is translation-like and it also is rotation in a sense that it has repetitive displacement. Whereas memory for just rotation was generally found out to be poor, that of revolution proved to be somewhat better, but not exactly as strong as that of translation. The sixth experiment, although involved a different stimulus, provided more evidence to the results previously gathered. This seems to be quite a tedious study to conduct.

Finally, Gilden and Price (2000) were able to come up with these conclusions: First, memory representations are based on an object’s displacement. Second, memory is sensitive to this displacement over multiple time scales. Finally, motion representations are created from whole objects, not from their parts. So where does rotation come here? Nowhere. It appears that although rotation seems to captivate people, it doesn’t really leave a lasting impression. This is probably why we have a hard time understanding the concept of rotating objects. I personally find torque quite distressing. It is possible to understand rotation, but this is not intuitive and doesn’t generalize to all kinds of rotations (Azar, 2000). Gilden says “Engineers, bicyclists, divers, ice skaters all understand rotations, but only within the domain in which they encounter rotation. Take them outside that domain and ask them to evaluate another rotational system and they don’t understand. Despite my training in physics and my ability to solve problems involving tops, I still wonder why they don’t fall over. (Azar, 2000)” For the common people, the implications may be that personal experience and practice is essential in doing something like pulling a car off a spin because intuition doesn’t work at all times. Gilden believes that our inability to fully understand spinning motions stems evolutionarily, in a sense that rotations weren’t really a thing in our ancestral past. The brain simply developed without a full cognitive understanding of it, responding with a strange fascination for spinning (Azar, 2000).

So the next time you go on a date, make sure you do something else besides ride on a ferris wheel. Because, hey, your date may just have been amazed by the sensation of spinning, and not exactly because you were together. References: Azar, B. (2000, February). Spinning May Fascinate, But It Leaves No Lasting Impression. Retrieved February 20, 2014, from American Psychological Association: Science Watch: http://www.apa.org/monitor/feb00/sw.aspx. Gilden, D., & Price, C. (2000). Representations of Motion and Direction. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance 26(1) , 18-30 DOI: 10.1037//0096-1523.26.1.18. All pictures from google.com Contributor: Elaiza Berame PS. Why not watch a (literally) spinning music video?

Enjoy!

[every-juan]

RoboCop?

With the reboot for the RoboCop franchise opening in just a few more weeks, we ponder just how possible the idea of an automated robot is. Certainly, he'd need to have a moral compass to differentiate right from wrong, cool gadgets, wicked martial arts skills and lightning quick reflexes. But wait, in order to achieve all of those other things, he'll need something more basic. A functional sense of hearing, perhaps? That's exactly what researchers at the University of Sunderland are doing. A team led by Dr. J.C. Murray from the center for Hybrid Intelligent Systems has been developing robots who are capable of auditory localization. At a height of just over a few feet, the robots don't look much more than garbage bins but when in action, they remind one of a robot straight out of star wars. Not a bunch of clumsy cans on wheels, the robots can direct and slowly maneuver into the best path to reach the sound source. Believe it or not, they run on pretty much the same hardware that runs your local computer. The rest is kept secret thanks to the nature of their research, at least for now. They are being trained and developed, not just to identify and record sounds but to react to them. Using software they developed, the relatively small yet complex robot calculates the difference in time it takes sound waves to reach one microphone implanted on one side in comparison to the other. It may seem like a simple process but when you consider the natural speed that sound travels, you'd realize that we're looking at differences here of just a few microseconds. The Interaural Time Difference is the difference in time it takes the sound waves to reach the farther ear, or in this case microphone. Humans, dogs and especially bats use these techniques to identify the location of objects producing sounds around them. Since the speed of sound is constant and the distance between the two microphones are constant, all it takes is some quick computing skills to determine which direction the sound is coming from. In his paper, Murray talks about the growing role of robots in our day to day lives. Many advancements have been achieved in terms of visual stimuli and it's incorporation into robotics but he thinks the field is still wide open or acoustics. A potential use for robots with these skills are tour guides, he says. This would require them to navigate effectively though their environment as well interact with the people around them. Clearly, the necessity for and adaptive and intelligent system capable of traversing auditory space is evident. While not yet commissioned for law enforcement, we hope that one day the roles of these listening robots may expand to include apprehending evildoers. For now, we have to be content with research for the sake of science. Who knows, perhaps 10 or 20 years from now, it could be exclaiming a very different motto: To Serve and Protect! References: http://www.informatik.uni-hamburg.de/WTM/ps/murray_ulm04.pdf

[every-juan]

Blog 3: Can't Help it, Just Can't help it.

Quick, what is the first thing you do when you see your bed?

So what did you think off in the statement? You imagined doing some form of action right? You imagined an action that would just removes your troubles and that would take you the night away. It's an action you, I and pretty much everyone are doing every night and you just can't help to have do so. You just can't help but stay in a state of relaxation just by being in this state. Yes, I am talking about sleeping. Although others might think of other things to do in bed (If you know what I mean), objects are generally are associated with certain kinds of actions. When we see a bathroom, we take a bath. When we see a dinning table, we eat on it (and hopefully don't steal food from your younger sibling).

These specific actions can be traced from the object itself. We see that a bathroom is used for taking a bath because there is water, soap and other materials. When we see a pencil, we use the tripod finger position when using it or something similar. When comparing the switch and button type for the light switch, you flick one and press the other respectively. You do this with the switch type because if you press on the switch, it might hurt your hand most especially if the switch is protruding. You don't flick the button type because nothing won't happen. All of these information from a given object that allows you to do certain actions is called AFFORDANCE.

So why do we need affordance? Isn't it just some fancy word? Well, it is similar to a schema. It tells us what we can and cannot do to an object. Would you believe me when I say that Affordance even works when you are not directly paying attention to the object? Well let me tell you a experiment by Makris et al (2013).

Makris and his colleagues wanted to find out the power of Affordance. To put this to the test, they asked the participants to look at a cross in front of them. Peripheral to the cross is two pictures. One picture has the affordance of grasping, such as a hammer. The other picture has the affordance of pinching, like bubble wrap. The pictures will be in polar ends of one another. Near the participants hands, there are 2 contraptions they must interact with. On one hand, they would have to grasp the contraption. On the other hand, they have to pinch. These contraptions have a very specific color. Their task is to interact with the contraption when they see the respective color shown at the background of the cross that is being focused.

There are two setup, one is where the pictures and the contraptions match affordances (the pic and contraption for grabbing are in the left and the pinching are in the right. The other setup is when they don't match affordances.

Results show that participants on the matching setup have a faster reaction time than the un-matching setup. This shows that Affordances actually save you time, energy and brain power.

Lesson learned, if you know that an object is not meant to be used for one action.. don't do it. You'll just be wasting time or worse....

References: Makris, S., Hadar, A. A., & Yarrow, K. (2013). Are object affordances fully automatic? A case of covert attention. Behavioral neuroscience, 127(5), 797.

All pics are from Google Godofredo Vistal

[every-juan]

Human lie detectors?

Photo Credit: Craftvision/Getty Images The tendency to view having neurological disorders as an unfortunate condition is all too spontaneous for us. Regardless of whether it's congenital or acquired, treatable or degenerative, mild, moderate or severe, to have a neurological condition is a sad thing; one way or another, there is 'lacking'. And we feel as though this 'lacking' should warrant a sense of pity – more than empathy – from us. It was Oliver Sacks (1985) who so aptly phrased it: Neurology's favorite word is 'deficit'. Speaking of Oliver Sacks, you probably heard of his famous book, "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat." What you probably don't know (if you're like me who is almost always the last to know!) is that there's more to the title. There's actually "...and other clinical tales". You see, the book is not really just about the man who mistook his wife for a hat, per se. The book is a collection of vignettes; his personal documentation of his patients' experiences and his own reflections during his decades of practice as a neurologist. One of my favorite vignettes is entitled "The President's Speech". Here, Sacks narrates how, while then-President Ronald Reagan, quite known for his rhetorics and emotional appeal, was delivering his speech, patients in the aphasia ward suddenly burst into laughter! (Aphasia is a neurological condition characterized by the inability to understand words. ) This baffled Sacks because how come the patients, in unison, seemed to grasp what Reagan was saying... or did they? Because if they did, how come they laughed? What's so funny, people? Sacks hypothesized that aphasics did not understand the words, BUT, because the brain has compensated for this inability to understand words, they became more sensitive to the tone as the words were uttered. It makes sense, because if you talk to the aphasics in your natural tone, they would understand; even if they cannot make sense of your words, they can make sense of your tone, your pitch, your intonation, suggestive emphasis, inflection, your emotions. After all, natural speech is not just composed of words. It is colored by sound. And if we factor in the verbal cues (facial expressions, bodily gestures), the more aphasics can interpret what you're saying... or in President Reagan's case, what he was NOT saying verbatim but what he was giving away thru auditory and visual cues; stuff that just fleeted by the rest of the 'normal' audience. To cut the story short, Sacks hypothesized that the patients with aphasia laughed at his speech because they detected that President Reagan was lying. Put in another way, he postulated that aphasics are human lie detectors. It wasn't until year 2000 that a group of researchers in Massachusetts headed by Nancy Etcoff conducted research which validated Sacks' hypothesis. They randomly showed a series of video clips to aphasics: one that showed attempts to conceal powerful negative emotions and another that honestly revealed positive emotions. They also showed them to persons with right cerebral hemisphere (to differentiate it from aphasia, which is caused by damage to the left cerebral hemisphere), persons with health cerebral hemispheres, and undergraduate students. The participants were tested in terms of their ability to detect lies in terms of facial expressions, pitch changes in the voice, and both. And what do you know? Aphasics significantly scored higher than any of the other groups! This validated Sacks' hypothesis that there is something special going on in the wirings of aphasics' brains. Although Etcoff and her co-workers did not conclusively make the assertion that aphasics are lie detectors (because it's possible that they just became more sensitive to non-verbal cues and therefore are not exactly detecting lies), essentially, they agree with Sacks that the brain is an amazing piece of shit. Take something away from it, and it will compensate for that loss. In neurological terms, this phenomenon is called plasticity. So, the next time you learn that somebody is suffering from a neurological disorder, instead of automatically reacting with pity, you might want to react with wonder. Ask: how does this person's brain compensate for the loss? References: Etcoff, N. L., Ekman, P., Magee, J. J., & Frank, M. G. (2000). Lie detection and language comprehension.Nature, 405(6783), 139-139.  Sacks, O. W. (1985). The man who mistook his wife for a hat and other clinical tales. New York: Summit Books.  By Gabrielle Tiongson

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Capturing Attention Through Motion

Motion is a key to survival. Motion of people, animals, and objects inform people about the direction they are heading and their behavior (Gibson, 1950, as cited in von Mühlenen & Lleras, 2007). Because of this, people will be able to react accordingly to ensure their safety. If a lion looks at you and aggressively runs in your direction, you better think of a plan on how to escape and save your life.

A study by Hillstrom & Yantis (1994, as cited in von Mühlenen & Lleras, 2007) states that motion attracts attention but the motion of the object should portend its location. Looming movement, oscillation, and close moving contours were a few of the kinds of motion used to get this result. They coined the new-object hypothesis which states that occurrences which signal the emergence of a novel item in a person’s visual field gets attention.

According to Folk, Remington, and Johnston (1992, as cited in von Mühlenen & Lleras, 2007), motion will acquire attention if the motion is important to the activity, that is, if motion is one of the features people are doing to get the activity accomplished. Motion will not catch attention if it is not useful in a person’s task. A waving hand in a sea of people will capture your attention if you are searching for someone and you presume him/her to wave his/her hand to catch your attention. But if you are looking for a store, the waving hand will not capture your attention.

von Mühlenen and Lleras (2007) conducted a study about motion and attention capture. 6 experiments were done to know more about the capacity of moving random dot patterns to capture attention, which was gauged by a probe-detection ability. All trials started with random movement (such as dots linearly displaced in varying directions). There was a moment when motion was coherent (such as all dots were displaced downwards, upwards, right wards or leftwards). Results stated that looming motion captured attention. Visual looming is a small adjustment in optical size (Wann, Poulter, & Purcell, 2011). Looming refers “to the simulated movement of stimuli toward the observer’s viewpoint such that they appear on a collision course (Skarratt, Gellatly, Cole, Pilling, & Hulleman, 2013, p. 2).”

von Mühlenen and Lleras (2007) states that the onset of motion most of the time gets attention regardless of the type of movement that proceeds the onset even if the stimulus of movement is not related to the activity. Looming motion, even in circumstances when movement data is not related to the activity, has an attentional edge unlike any movement produced by onsets of motion. Looming movement can alert a person that there is danger, for example a predator moving towards the observer.

References: Skarratt, P. A., Gellatly, A. H., Cole, G. G., Pilling, M., & Hulleman, J. (2013). Looming Motion Primes the Visuomotor System. Journal Of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception And Performance, doi:10.1037/a0034456 von Mühlenen, A., & Lleras, A. (2007). No-onset looming motion guides spatial attention. Journal Of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception And Performance, 33(6), 1297-1310. doi:10.1037/0096-1523.33.6.1297 Wann, J. P., Poulter, D. R., & Purcell, C. (2011). Reduced sensitivity to visual looming inflates the risk posed by speeding vehicles when children try to cross the road. Psychological Science, doi: 10.1177/0956797611400917 Reference for Images (Images are from google): http://www.google.com.ph/imgres?hl=en&biw=1071&bih=264&tbm=isch&tbnid=WmuOcemKZ2Nb8M%3A&imgrefurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dailystar.co.uk%2Fnews%2Flatest-news%2F269341%2FLion-on-the-loose-in-Essex&docid=Sk-dxzPsWG69CM&imgurl=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.dailystar-uk.co.uk%2Fdynamic%2F1%2F281x351%2F269341_1.jpg&w=281&h=351&ei=h-YEU-yfKMHIkAWSwoHABg&zoom=1&ved=0CMwBEIQcMCY&iact=rc&dur=468&page=4&start=37&ndsp=16 http://www.google.com.ph/imgres?hl=en&biw=1092&bih=532&tbm=isch&tbnid=wuMUaUxYcvbpJM%3A&imgrefurl=http%3A%2F%2Fforum.hon.garena.com%2Fshowthread.php%3F31412-Taunt-nuclear-missile&docid=w6S7uTKGh8HMWM&imgurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.colourbox.com%2Fpreview%2F1995763-122205-3d-illustration-of-cartoon-rocket-flying-to-target.jpg&w=480&h=360&ei=UOcEU8rFBoS0kAXSqICICA&zoom=1&ved=0CIgBEIQcMBM&iact=rc&dur=1029&page=2&start=9&ndsp=13 http://www.google.com.ph/imgres?start=132&hl=en&biw=1092&bih=498&tbm=isch&tbnid=NoIAM2RZMEdjrM%3A&imgrefurl=http%3A%2F%2Fthestonerabbit.typepad.com%2Fthe_stone_rabbit%2Fexercise%2F&docid=-fUBpql6FoNGqM&imgurl=http%3A%2F%2Fthestonerabbit.typepad.com%2F.a%2F6a00e551ebc5ca88340153916589c8970b-500wi&w=500&h=335&ei=4ecEU4rPL8ixkgXU2oCYAw&zoom=1&ved=0CIMBEIQcMCo4ZA&iact=rc&dur=780&page=12&ndsp=12 http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/store/10.1111/j.1467-7687.2011.01123.x/asset/image_m/DESC_1123_f1gam.gif?v=1&s=927c93643d56580924a1987ebab4b5e5f00e8eb0 http://www.google.com.ph/imgres?hl=en&biw=1092&bih=498&tbm=isch&tbnid=50fAwuyQOd7zyM%3A&imgrefurl=http%3A%2F%2Fchannel.nationalgeographic.com%2Fwild%2Fdead-or-alive%2Fgalleries%2Fgrizzly-woods%2F&docid=5ckRYgmbBzj7CM&imgurl=http%3A%2F%2Fchannel.nationalgeographic.com%2Fexposure%2Fcontent%2Fphoto%2Fphoto%2F2073011_non-stop-assault_u4otpkuoohegc34cxym6cgqbe3ncurxrbvj6lwuht2ya6mzmafma_380x285.jpg&w=380&h=285&ei=sOgEU5a_EsnikAWOlYDABw&zoom=1&ved=0CM8BEIQcMCg&iact=rc&dur=748&page=4&start=32&ndsp=13 By Lavinia Lyka L. Lopez