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Social touch is essential to human development and communication. Mediated social touch is suggested as a solution for circumstances where distance prevents skin-to-skin contact. However, past research aimed at demonstrating efficacy of mediated touch in reducing stress and promoting helping have produced mixed findings. These inconsistent findings could possibly be due to insufficient control of contextual factors combined with unnatural interaction scenarios. For example, touch occurs less frequently among strangers and is often accompanied with nonverbal visual cues. We investigated how visual presentation of touch, and interpersonal relationship to the sender influence perception, affective experiences, and autonomic responses the touch evoke. Fifty couples of mixed gender were recruited. A mediated touch was repeatedly applied by either the male partner or male confederate to female participants. The latter witnessed through a webcam as the sender caressed a rubber hand or touchpad to send the touch. Following our hypotheses, touch sent by one's partner was perceived softer and more comforting than stranger touch. The partner's touch also resulted in weaker skin conductance responses, particularly when sent by touching a touchpad. In sum, how a mediated touch is experienced depends both on who is touching, and on how the touch is visually represented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Physiological responses to persuasion can help to increase our understanding of persuasive processes, and thereby the effectiveness of persuasive interventions. However, a clear relationship between psychophysiology and persuasion is not yet established. This article investigates if peripheral physiology predicts persuasion effectiveness, and whether peripheral physiology yields information that is not represented in other predictors of persuasion. We studied physiological reactions in the cardiovascular, electrodermal, facial muscle and respiratory systems of 75 participants while they read gain- or loss-framed persuasive messages advocating increased oral health care behavior. Persuasion effectiveness was measured as pre to post intervention changes in self-reported attitudes and intentions, as well as through changes in behavioral compliance over three weeks. Overall, participants showed stronger attitudes and intentions directly after the intervention (short-term persuasion), but did not show changes in behavior or attitudes two weeks later (no long-term persuasion). On an individual level, physiological reactivity parameters yielded additional information – next to self-report measures – to predict persuasion effectiveness on attitude, intention and behavioral compliance. To conclude, our findings suggested a positive relationship between physiological reactivity to persuasive messages and subsequent attitudes, intentions and behavior, and quantified the extra personalization that psychophysiological measures might bring to persuasive messaging. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Measurement of physiological reactions to persuasive messages can improve our understanding of psychological processes of persuasion, and potentially further enhance and personalize current persuasion interventions. However, little is known about the relationship between psychophysiology and persuasive processes. This study focused on four persuasion principles: scarcity, commitment, consensus, and authority, and people's susceptibility to them. Physiological measures included the cardiovascular, respiratory, and electrodermal system, as well as facial motor systems. Psychological measures consisted of self-reported attitude towards oral care and susceptibility to persuasion (STPS). We performed a randomized within-subject experiment in which fifty-six participants viewed persuasive messages deploying the aforementioned persuasion principles to improve their oral care. Results indicated different physiological patterns during persuasion versus rest. We found no different physiological patterns in exposure to distinct persuasion principles, nor a clear correlation with susceptibility to individual persuasion principles. However, mixed model analysis illustrated that overall STPS scores help explain variance in reactivity of skin conductance level and skin conductance response, and reactivity in the zygomaticus major: lower susceptibility relates to higher reactivity. Summarizing, we have found no conclusive support for distinct psychophysiological patterns associated with different persuasion principles, although overall susceptibility seems to be reflected in physiology to some extent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

People with some signs of binocular dysfunctioning can be susceptible to visual complaints associated with viewing stereoscopic content at large viewing distances. Two performance measurements enabled to distinguish people by their binocular status (BS) in previous research: the ratio of performance of the Wilkins rate of reading test (WRRT) between 2-D and 3-D, and the vergence facility. In an experiment, first, an extensive optometric screening was carried out to differentiate visually asymptomatic young adults with good BS (GBS) (N=27) from those with a moderate BS (MBS) (N=6). Second, participants had to perform the WRRT at short viewing distance followed by a questionnaire under different screen disparity settings. The results reveal that the ratio of the WRRT between 0 and -1.5 screen disparity is an appropriate indicator of participants with MBS in comparison with participants with GBS. In addition, the results show that 0.75^\circ of screen disparity is already problematic for people with MBS. We conclude that the WRRT-ratio has potential as a BS test in consumer applications to provide individual settings for comfortable screen disparities based on viewers' BS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Perceived image quality is a standard evaluation concept for 2D imaging systems. When applied to stereoscopic 3D imaging systems, however, it does not incorporate the added value of stereoscopic depth. Higher level evaluation concepts (naturalness and viewing experience) are proposed that are sensitive to both image quality and stereoscopic depth. A 3D Quality Model is constructed in which such higher level evaluation concepts are expressed as a weighted sum of image quality and perceived depth. This model is validated by means of three experiments, in which stereoscopic depth (camera base distances and screen disparity) and image quality (white Gaussian noise and Gaussian blur) are varied. The resulting stimuli are evaluated in terms of naturalness, viewing experience, image quality and depth percept. Analysis revealed that viewing experience and naturalness incorporated variations in image quality to a similar extent, yet the added value of stereoscopic depth is incorporated significantly more by naturalness. This result classifies naturalness as the most appropriate concept to evaluate 3D quality of stereoscopic stills. The 3D Quality Model based on naturalness as evaluation concept is validly applicable to stereoscopic stills and the naturalness score is determined for approximately 75% by image quality and for approximately 25% by the added value of stereoscopic depth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite a variety of new communication technologies, loneliness is prevalent in Western countries. Boosting emotional communication through intimate connections has the potential to reduce loneliness. New technologies might exploit biosignals as intimate emotional cues because of their strong relationship to emotions. Through two studies, we investigate the possibilities of heartbeat communication as an intimate cue. In the first study (N = 32), we demonstrate, using self-report and behavioral tracking in an immersive virtual environment, that heartbeat perception influences social behavior in a similar manner as traditional intimate signals such as gaze and interpersonal distance. In the second study (N = 34), we demonstrate that a sound of the heartbeat is not sufficient to cause the effect; the stimulus must be attributed to the conversational partner in order to have influence. Together, these results show that heartbeat communication is a promising way to increase intimacy. Implications and possibilities for applications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]