TY - JOUR A1 - Seibt, Beate A1 - Mühlberger, Andreas A1 - Likowski, Katja U. A1 - Weyers, Peter T1 - Facial mimicry in its social setting JF - Frontiers in Psychology N2 - In interpersonal encounters, individuals often exhibit changes in their own facial expressions in response to emotional expressions of another person. Such changes are often called facial mimicry. While this tendency first appeared to be an automatic tendency of the perceiver to show the same emotional expression as the sender, evidence is now accumulating that situation, person, and relationship jointly determine whether and for which emotions such congruent facial behavior is shown. We review the evidence regarding the moderating influence of such factors on facial mimicry with a focus on understanding the meaning of facial responses to emotional expressions in a particular constellation. From this, we derive recommendations for a research agenda with a stronger focus on the most common forms of encounters, actual interactions with known others, and on assessing potential mediators of facial mimicry. We conclude that facial mimicry is modulated by many factors: attention deployment and sensitivity, detection of valence, emotional feelings, and social motivations. We posit that these are the more proximal causes of changes in facial mimicry due to changes in its social setting. KW - cultural differences KW - political leaders KW - mimicry KW - cooperation KW - self-focused attention KW - emotional empathy KW - nonconscious mimicry KW - expressive displays KW - gender differences KW - speech anxiety KW - behavior KW - responses KW - facial expression KW - EMG KW - competition KW - mood Y1 - 2015 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-151415 VL - 6 IS - 1122 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Vangeel, Elise Beau A1 - Pishva, Ehsan A1 - Hompes, Titia A1 - van den Hove, Daniel A1 - Lambrechts, Diether A1 - Allegaert, Karel A1 - Freson, Kathleen A1 - Izzi, Benedetta A1 - Claes, Stephan T1 - Newborn genome-wide DNA methylation in association with pregnancy anxiety reveals a potential role for \(GABBR1\) JF - Clinical Epigenetics N2 - Background: There is increasing evidence for the role of prenatal stress in shaping offspring DNA methylation and disease susceptibility. In the current study, we aimed to identify genes and pathways associated with pregnancy anxiety using a genome-wide DNA methylation approach. Methods: We selected 22 versus 23 newborns from our Prenatal Early Life Stress (PELS) cohort, exposed to the lowest or highest degree of maternal pregnancy anxiety, respectively. Cord blood genome-wide DNA methylation was assayed using the HumanMethylation450 BeadChip (HM450, n = 45) and candidate gene methylation using EpiTYPER (n = 80). Cortisol levels were measured at 2, 4, and 12 months of age to test infant stress system (re)activity. Results: Data showed ten differentially methylated regions (DMR) when comparing newborns exposed to low versus high pregnancy anxiety scores. We validated a top DMR in the GABA-B receptor subunit 1 gene (GABBR1) revealing the association with pregnancy anxiety particularly in male newborns (most significant CpG Pearson R = 0.517, p = 0.002; average methylation Pearson R = 0.332, p = 0.039). Cord blood GABBR1 methylation was associated with infant cortisol levels in response to a routine vaccination at 4 months old. Conclusions: In conclusion, our results show that pregnancy anxiety is associated with differential DNA methylation patterns in newborns and that our candidate gene GABBR1 is associated with infant hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis response to a stressor. Our findings reveal a potential role for GABBR1 methylation in association with stress and provide grounds for further research. KW - DNA methylation KW - GABBR1 KW - gender differences KW - HPA axis KW - pregnancy anxiety KW - prenatal stress Y1 - 2017 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-173825 VL - 9 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Lange, Benjamin P. A1 - Wühr, Peter A1 - Schwarz, Sascha T1 - Of Time Gals and Mega Men: Empirical Findings on Gender Differences in Digital Game Genre Preferences and the Accuracy of Respective Gender Stereotypes JF - Frontiers in Psychology N2 - We investigated the accuracy of gender stereotypes regarding digital game genre preferences. In Study 1, 484 female and male participants rated their preference for 17 game genres (gender differences). In Study 2, another sample of 226 participants rated the extent to which the same genres were presumably preferred by women or men (gender stereotypes). We then compared the results of both studies in order to determine the accuracy of the gender stereotypes. Study 1 revealed actual gender differences for most genres—mostly of moderate size. Study 2 revealed substantial gender stereotypes about genre preferences. When comparing the results from both studies, we found that gender stereotypes were accurate in direction for most genres. However, they were, to some degree, inaccurate in size: For most genres, gender stereotypes overestimated the actual gender difference with a moderate mean effect size. KW - digital game KW - genre KW - stereotype accuracy KW - gender differences KW - sex differences Y1 - 2021 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-238278 SN - 1664-1078 VL - 12 ER -