Social Engineering Blogs

An Aggregator for Blogs About Social Engineering and Related Fields

The Humintell Blog April 29, 2014

Mapping Feelings

Feelings are often associated with physical reactions: terror can send chills down your spine, and love can leave you weak in the knees.  A recent study has linked specific emotions to physical sensations. Researchers at the Academy of Finland and Aalto University tested emotional responses in hundreds of subjects and then created maps identifying locations in the body where emotions cause physical changes.

They found that common emotions trigger strong sensations in specific parts of our bodies. The study was conducted with over 700 participants from Finland, Sweden and Taiwan. The findings indicate that emotions and their bodily responses have a biological basis.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Where Do You Feel Your Strongest Emotion ?

Filed Under: Cross Culture, culture, Nonverbal Behavior, Science

The Humintell Blog January 23, 2014

The Victor’s Stance

hi-judo-anger-852-jpgIn recent years there has been much talk about the stance a winner takes after a competition.  Originally labeled as pride, this “victory” stance has been studied by many researchers.  With the winter Olympics just around the corner it is prudent to note new research findings for the triumphant body language of the victor’s stance.

Time Magazine reports on the new findings from researchers at San Francisco State University that suggest the victory stance may be inherited and that athletes instinctively display this “aggressive dominance” over their opponent.

“It raises interesting questions about the history of sports in general,” says Dr. David Matsumoto, lead author of the study and professor of psychology at the university, “They are rarified forms of competition, and there is something very basic and primal about sports that lends itself nicely to these reactions and keeps them alive.”

Matsumoto became aware of the ubiquitousness of this posture during his years as the U.S. Olympic coach for judo.  “What I saw everyday in training and in competition had nothing to do with pride,” he says. “It’s all about just having clobbered somebody. It’s a sign or signal given to other members of the community who are watching.”

He goes on to note that it’s likely an evolutionary trait, based on a need to express triumph, and dominance – and that it was something instinctive, that athletes weren’t even aware of conscious of doing.

From his previous work, Matsumoto coded these behaviors as expressing dominance rather than pride.  This was due to the fact that pride tends to be more reflective involving more gentle and internally directed behaviors. It also occurs at least a few seconds after the victory.

Dr. Matsumoto and his colleagues to studied video of Olympic judo medal matches and zeroed in on the athletes’ very first reactions after the match was over. CBC News  reports that the researchers reviewed more than 35 athletes from different countries, including congenitally blind competitors in the 2004 Paralympics.  Their report published in the journal Motivation and Emotion, they found that victors consistently engaged in any of a number of dominance behaviors, including throwing their hands up, expanding their chests, shouting, making fists, or pumping the air. The losers in the matches never exhibited such reactions, instead keeping their heads down and averting their gaze from those nearby.

The same effect was documented among Paralympic athletes who were born blind, and never had the opportunity to observe these dominance displays. “This is a phenomenon that is occurring in people all around the world, in people who are blind and never saw it happen,” he says. “There is something wired in us to do that at that particular moment.”

 

Filed Under: Cross Culture, culture

The Humintell Blog January 14, 2014

Trait Psychology- Dr. David Matsumoto

In the video below Dr. Matsumoto explains the structure of traits- dispositions that we have to act or behave in a certain way.

Studies that involve analyzing traits, especially across cultures, have come to find that there seems to be a universal structure of traits.  That is, people all around the world have basic traits that are consistent regardless of the culture they are from, such as conscientiousness, openness, agreeableness, extroversion, and neuroticism.

Click here to view the embedded video.

These “Big Five Traits”, as psychology has coined them, have been found in every culture that has been studied (this is not to say that different cultures do not display any other traits).

“There is a lot of evidence that suggests that there is a biological component to traits [as well as a cultural one],“ purported Dr. Matsumoto.

Filed Under: Cross Culture, culture, Science

  • « Previous Page
  • 1
  • …
  • 5
  • 6
  • 7
  • 8
  • 9
  • …
  • 12
  • Next Page »

About

Welcome to an aggregator for blogs about social engineering and related fields. Feel free to take a look around, and make sure to visit the original sites.

If you would like to suggest a site or contact us, use the links below.

Contact

  • Contact
  • Suggest a Site
  • Remove a Site

© Copyright 2025 Social Engineering Blogs · All Rights Reserved ·