Picture courtesy of Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/ajay_g/
The history of film began over a hundred years ago in the 1890s with the invention of the first motion-picture cameras. Since then, film making has become a multi-million dollar industry and most movie watchers can name a few films that have made them laugh or cry. Movies have become a large part of American culture, but why is movie watching such an emotional experience?
Amy Palowski, a Today Show contributor, interviewed Dr. Jeffrey Zacks to answer this question.
Zacks is a Professor of Psychology and Director of the Dynamic Cognition Laboratory at Washington University in St. Louis. He’s recently written a book entitled Flicker: Your Brain on Movies which examines how we have such powerful reactions to films.
An abbreviated version of the interview is below. The complete interview can be found here.
Q. How are filmmakers able to push our buttons?
A. One way that we perceive emotion in film is through I process I call the Mirror Rule, which says that it’s a good idea to mimic the visual input that you’re seeing. So if you walk up to somebody and they smile at you, it’s good to smile back.
If you watch somebody in the theater and there’s a smiling face filling the screen, most of the audience is going to pop a little bit of a smile.
When we’re smiling, we tend to feel happier. When we’re frowning, we tend to feel angrier. So that combination of the Mirror Rule and the reading of emotion by the brain off the current state of the body is enough to produce emotion.
In film, a filmmaker has the opportunity to integrate those things very tightly. He can control exactly what’s shown of the face and what else is present. And the viewer has much less opportunity to walk away or focus on other things.
Q. Why do we cry at movies?
A. You’ve got this facial mirroring that causes your face to wind up in a sad pose, and that evokes a sad emotion. You’ve identified with the character and you’re reasoning about the fact that they would be sad and that produces empathetic sadness in you.
Music plays a big role in emotion and film. Often, sad movies have slow minor key music at the points that they’re trying to get you to cry.
We encounter minor key music in real life, we see people who cry and we watch bad things happen to other people—all these things make us feel sad. But in a movie, you can crank those things up to 11. You can put a big crying face that fills up your whole visual field so there’s no other place to look.
You can set up situations that are most upsetting and put three of them in a film and then you can play sad music. You put all those things together and it’s just taking the mechanisms that we encounter in real life and just really pushing all the buttons at once.
Q. Do you think it’s easier to cry at the movies?
A. I’ve had that experience myself. In real life, I’m a pretty stoic person but I’ve been at movies that were not even good movies that had me bawling like a baby. Some of the emotional stimuli that we create in movies are supernormal stimuli.
Q. Is the same true for happiness?
A. Absolutely, but in both movies and in real life, the tragic thing is it’s a lot easier to make people sad than to make people happy.
For a review of the movie The Artist and what it teaches us about nonverbal behavior, take a look at this article written by Dr. David Matsumoto.
What businesses can learn from armadillos, seahorses, and zebras. 
By GilesWitherspoon-BoydHackers are a lot like predators in the wild. After finding an unsuspecting animal, nature’s hunters test their victim for weaknesses before taking it down. Just like nature’s hunters, hackers aren’t looking for a challenge. They’re looking for an easy target. Unfortunately, it seems as if hackers are always one step ahead. So how do you avoid becoming dinner? Take a clue from nature. It’s all about defense mechanisms.
Tweet1. The LookoutDwarf mongoose post sentries that stand on their hind legs to watch for birds (their main predator). When a bird is sighted, they send a warning call to others and run to safety. 
Just like the sentries that stand outside dwarf mongoose burrows, businesses have file integrity monitoring software, or log monitoring. Log monitoring systems collect and store logs. Logs are user actions inside an operating system (e.g., renaming a file, opening an application). Some systems have a real-time reporting system (like the dwarf mongoose call) that alerts you via email or text of suspicious activity.
Reviewing logs on a regular basis helps identify malicious attacks on your system. According to the PCI DSS, businesses are supposed to have 12 months of logs stored, with 3 months readily available. Systems that have log monitoring capabilities include operating systems, Internet browsers, point of sale systems, firewalls, and intrusion detection systems (IDS). Some systems do not automatically enable logging (e.g., Windows XP out of the box has logging turned off).2. The UpgraderIn the animal kingdom, bigger is often better. A larger, stronger set of antlers helps white-tailed bucks successfully battle other males during mating season. Every year, they shed their antlers to grow bigger ones for next season.
Just like deer upgrade their antlers, you should be regularly updating your software to make sure it has the most up to date patches for security vulnerabilities. Devices and software that should be regularly updated include: operating systems, anti-virus software, POS terminals, firewalls, intrusion detection systems (IDS), mobile devices, Internet browsers, app software, and more. 3. The HiderEveryone knows that chameleons change colors to match their environment and allow attackers to pass them over. But so do seahorses, cuttlefish, octopus, and dozens of other animals. Changing colors is a great defense mechanism for animals without strength or stamina. 
Just like these animals hide their vulnerable bodies, it’s important for you to hide what’s most important to your business: customer credit card data. Did you know 63% of businesses store unencrypted card data? If a credit card isn’t encrypted, it’s completely exposed on your network, with no camouflage protecting it from predators snooping around. Encryption is the best way to hide data, but by finding and deleting unnecessary data, you have nothing to hide. After all, hackers can’t steal what isn’t there.4. The TankSome animals undergo structural changes to protect their bodies from predators. Take the thick skin of the armadillo. It’s made of an armor-like substance and can roll into an indestructible ball if the armadillo is threatened. 
The structural change businesses should use to protect their business is a firewall, both software and hardware. Like a security guard, properly configured firewalls control what goes in, and what comes out of your business. SEE ALSO: How Does a Firewall Protect a Business?5. The TricksterZebras use their striped pattern as an optical illusion to confuse predators. Because each zebra has a unique striped pattern, it’s difficult for predators to single one out. 
Businesses should apply the zebra strategy to passwords. Each network, device, and user should have a unique username and password. In addition, make sure each of those unique passwords are difficult to guess. The easiest way to create a tricky password is by creating a passphrase. Anyone love Corey Hart’s 1980’s hit, “I wear my sunglasses at night”? If you do, good. If not, too bad. It’s turning into my example passphrase. To create a complex passphrase, take the first letter of each word, and substitute special characters/numbers where you can. I wear my sunglasses at night –> Iwmsg@n1980!6. The TeacherIn a recent study on lion cubs, researchers learned lions aren’t born with a natural fear of humans. They learn it from their mothers and the rest of the pride. For a species like lions to continue to prosper, their defense mechanism is to quickly teach their young to avoid other species that could harm them…aka humans.
Training is such a crucial security strategy. I can’t count how many compromises could have been prevented if staff were simply educated on the dangers of hackers. Business owners, IT staff, and managers must train staff members on physical security, phishing, passwords, policies, etc. so they can take the necessary steps to protect the business. 7. The IntimidatorHave you ever seen a lizard do a pushup? Those lizards are showing their strength to intimidate predators. Do you know the reason gazelles jump so high? It’s to demonstrate their ability to outrun pursuers. You know those lizards that flare extra skin around their neck when they are threatened? By doing so, they appear larger and more threatening to those that may try to eat them.
With nothing but their body language, animals signal to predators, “Attacking me is not worth your time. So don’t even try.”While it’s difficult to show to a hacker just how strong your business security posture is, the best way all-around way to maintain solid security is by complying with the PCI DSS. That means going through each section of the Self-Assessment Questionnaire (SAQ) and ensuring your organization’s compliance with all the requirements.SEE ALSO: Which PCI SAQ is Right for My Business?If you liked this post, please share!
Giles Witherspoon-Boyd (PCIP) is Enterprise Account Manager at SecurityMetrics and assists businesses in defining their PCI DSS scope. Follow him on Twitter and check out his other blog posts.