Mimicry is the replication of another person’s behaviour and/or physiological state in short temporal succession of the original behaviour. It can be differentiated into autonomic mimicry and motor...Show moreMimicry is the replication of another person’s behaviour and/or physiological state in short temporal succession of the original behaviour. It can be differentiated into autonomic mimicry and motor mimicry, with the former denoting mimicry of autonomic nervous system activity such as heart rate, with visible behaviours such as blushing or pupil dilation, whereas motor mimicry is any mimicry of motor movements. Together, these two types of autonomic mimicry result in emotional mimicry, also called emotional contagion. The primary aspect of emotional mimicry is reciprocal evaluation, as people with positive affiliation towards each other exhibit it the most. However, socially anxious people have deficiencies in motor mimicry and do not prefer a mimicking partner. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate whether highly socially anxious people would evaluate virtual characters exhibiting autonomic mimicry less positively than low socially anxious individuals. Within the study, 29 people with different levels of social anxiety were exposed to autonomic mimicry through pupil dilation by three virtual characters telling three different stories, whilst three others told stories without mimicking the participants, but still exhibiting occasional pupil dilation. Comfortability around the characters was measured through the desire for future interaction scale, and liking through an avatar evaluation questionnaire. Two repeated measures analyses of variance (ANOVA) and two mixed ANOVA were conducted and yielded no significant differences in evaluation between the mimicry conditions, nor any significant mediation of these differences by the social anxiety group, suggesting that differences in peoples’ evaluations of mimicry are primarily reserved to motor mimicry.Show less
Mimicry has been researched regarding how it relates to the emotional contagion and therefore how it leads to feelings of empathy in others. Autonomic mimicry leads to synchronized physiological...Show moreMimicry has been researched regarding how it relates to the emotional contagion and therefore how it leads to feelings of empathy in others. Autonomic mimicry leads to synchronized physiological processes between two individuals, supposedly to create a feeling of connectedness and trust. Blush is a rarely investigated part of autonomic mimicry, a kind of physiological mimicry in humans that is not consciously controlled. Blushing has been associated with trustworthiness, a fundamental component to establish empathy. Previous research has shown that individuals who blush are perceived as more trustworthy and following the research on the emotional contagion, blush mimicry should have a similar effect. This study investigated whether individuals mimic a blushing Virtual Character (VC) and whether mimicking blushing establishes feelings of trust for a VC. Trustworthiness is investigated using a trust game, blushing is measured with skin temperature. T-tests were used to investigated whether individuals mimic blushing expressions of the VC, which resulted in inconclusive findings. Linear regression analyses were used to predict trustworthiness from participants’ blush. Blushing mimicry did not increase investment in the trust game. This result indicates that the mimicry itself might not be the basis of feelings of trust in others, despite previous findings. Perceiving and mimicking blushing might provoke different reactions from different individuals. Additionally, blush is triggered by emotions like embarrassment and guilt in social situations, which could be distorted by using VCs. Limitations include the lacking social context with the VC, the neutral content of the stories, and the sample size. Future research should investigate responses of individuals to VCs and control for external factors of facial redness.Show less
The human eye, due to its unique morphology, is central for social interactions. Eye contact and mutual eye gaze are important to infer other’s emotions and to share experiences. In particular,...Show moreThe human eye, due to its unique morphology, is central for social interactions. Eye contact and mutual eye gaze are important to infer other’s emotions and to share experiences. In particular, pupillary changes, dilation and constriction, provide implicit cues to infer internal states of an interacting partner: when one experiences pleasant feelings, pupils dilate. Individuals with larger pupils are evaluated as more friendly, attractive, and trustworthy than those with smaller pupils. During human interactions changes in pupil diameter synchronize, a phenomenon called pupil mimicry. In particular, dilation mimicry correlates with increased perceived trustworthiness. Aim of the hereby research is to further investigate the relationship between pupil mimicry and trust. To do so, we conducted an experiment in which participants listened to a series of virtual characters narrating neutral stories while changes in there pupil diameter were recorded via an eye-tracker, allowing us to assess the presence of pupil mimicry by participants. A questionnaire after each interaction, in addition to an investment game were exploited to measure level of trust. A simple linear regression analysis was conducted to investigate whether pupil mimicry is a predictor for trust, selecting cases by neutral stories. Despite our predictions -based on previous studies-, results proved our hypothesis wrong showing non-significant results for three neutral stories. Results were significant concerning two stories but showing the opposite trend than the expected one. Within the discussion session, limitations of the study which might explain such results will be exposed.Show less
