Measuring Embodiment: Movement Complexity and the Impact of Personal Characteristics.

A user's personal experiences and characteristics may impact the strength of an embodiment illusion and affect resulting behavioral changes in unknown ways. This paper presents a novel re-analysis of two fully-immersive embodiment user-studies (n = 189 and n = 99) using structural equation modeling, to test the effects of personal characteristics on subjective embodiment. Results demonstrate that individual characteristics (gender, participation in science, technology, engineering or math - Experiment 1, age, video gaming experience - Experiment 2) predicted differing self-reported experiences of embodiment Results also indicate that increased self-reported embodiment predicts environmental response, in this case faster and more accurate responses within the virtual environment.

Self-Disclosure Valence on Facebook: Effects on Social Attractiveness and User Reactions.

With the growing popularity of social media, people are sharing more personal information online. This study explored how online self-disclosure post valence (positive vs. negative) affects participants' willingness to interact with the discloser.

Effects of Transparency on Perceived Humanness: Implications for Rendering Skin Tones Using Optical See-Through Displays.

Current optical see-through displays in the field of augmented reality are limited in their ability to display colors with low lightness in the hue, saturation, lightness (HSL) color space, causing such colors to appear transparent. This hardware limitation may add unintended bias into scenarios with virtual humans. Humans have varying skin tones including HSL colors with low lightness.

Gender Differences in Anticipated but Not Behavioral Confrontation of Heterosexist Comments.

Heterosexist comments are prevalent, but they can be combatted by recognizing and confronting them. Using a 2 (participant gender: woman, man) by 2 (heterosexist comment: gender-policing, sexuality-based) design, we evaluated gender differences in ratings of offensiveness and confrontations of heterosexist comments. In Study 1 ( = 110), participants imagined interacting with a person who made a heterosexist comment.

Evidence of Racial Bias Using Immersive Virtual Reality: Analysis of Head and Hand Motions During Shooting Decisions.

Shooter bias is the tendency to more quickly shoot at unarmed Black suspects compared to unarmed White suspects. The primary goal of this research was to investigate the efficacy of shooter bias simulation studies in a more realistic immersive virtual scenario instead of the traditional methodologies using desktop computers. In this paper we present results from a user study (N=99) investigating shooter and racial bias in an immersive virtual environment.

How do confronters want perpetrators to respond? Defining successful confrontation as the match between desired and actual outcomes.

Research on confronting prejudice frequently defines an effective confrontation as one that induces change in the perpetrator's prejudicial beliefs or actions. We argue for a broader definition, defining successful confrontation as one that elicits the confronter's desired response. Using a community sample of 152 adults, we conducted an exploratory study in which participants recalled a time when they had confronted racism or sexism.

Strategic confrontation: Examining the utility of low stakes prodding as a strategy for confronting sexism.

Confronting sexism has been routinely operationalized in experimental research as assertive behavior that expresses disapproval of sexism. The present research examines an indirect confrontation strategy we term . We first establish the use of this strategy in a real-time sexist situation (Pilot study, = 59), then test whether this indirect type of confrontation is considered to be an effective strategy for reducing sexism (Study 1, = 138), and finally investigate whether low stakes prodding is deliberately used to avoid work-related costs (Study 2, 129).

The Effect of Gender Body-Swap Illusions on Working Memory and Stereotype Threat.

The underrepresentation of women in technical and STEM fields is a well-known problem, and stereotype threatening situations have been linked to the inability to recruit and retain women into these fields. Virtual reality enables the unique ability to perform body-swap illusions, and research has shown that these illusions can change participant behavior. Characteristically people take on the traits of the avatar they are embodying.

Coping and posttraumatic growth in women with limb amputations.

While ample research has examined the psychological experiences of men with limb amputations, minimal research has examined the psychological experiences of women with limb amputations. The present study utilizes a qualitative design to examine coping and posttraumatic growth in women with limb amputations. Thirty women completed the posttraumatic growth inventory (PTGI) and provided open-ended responses about coping, social support, discrimination, support groups, and acceptance.

Racial athletic stereotype confirmation in college football recruiting.

The present study tested real-world racial stereotype use in the context of college athletic recruiting. Stereotype confirmation suggests that observers use stereotypes as hypotheses and interpret relevant evidence in a biased way that confirms their stereotypes. Shifting standards suggest that the evaluative standard to which we hold a target changes as a function of their group membership.

Communicating more than diversity: The effect of institutional diversity statements on expectations and performance as a function of race and gender.

The present studies examined whether colorblind diversity messages, relative to multicultural diversity messages, serve as an identity threat that undermines performance-related outcomes for individuals at the intersections of race and gender. We exposed racial/ethnic majority and minority women and men to either a colorblind or multicultural diversity statement and then measured their expectations about overall diversity, anticipated bias, and group task performance (Study 1, N = 211), as well as their expectations about distinct race and gender diversity and their actual performance on a math test (Study 2, N = 328). Participants expected more bias (Study 1) and less race and gender diversity (Study 2) after exposure to a colorblind versus a multicultural message.

The gender role motivation model of women's sexually submissive behavior and satisfaction in heterosexual couples.

Previous findings suggest that women are more likely than men to take on the submissive role during sexual activities (e.g., waiting for their partner to initiate and orchestrate sexual activities), often to the detriment of their sexual satisfaction.

Blood quantum and perceptions of black-white biracial targets: the black ancestry prototype model of affirmative action.

The present study examined the causal role of amount of Black ancestry in targets' perceived fit with Black prototypes and perceivers' categorization of biracial targets. Greater Black ancestry increased the likelihood that perceivers categorized biracial targets as Black and perceived targets as fitting Black prototypes (e.g.

Sources of self-categorization as minority for mixed-race individuals: Implications for affirmative action entitlement.

Multiracial individuals are in the unique position of being able to categorize themselves as members of multiple racial groups. Drawing on self-categorization theory, we suggest that similarity to the minority ingroup depends on self-perceptions of physical appearance and connectedness to the minority ingroup. Moreover, we argue that similarity to the ingroup determines self-categorization as minority, which predicts category-based entitlements such as perceived eligibility for minority resources (e.

The effects of gender stereotypic and counter-stereotypic textbook images on science performance.

We investigated the effect of gender stereotypic and counter-stereotypic images on male and female high school students' science comprehension and anxiety. We predicted stereotypic images to induce stereotype threat in females and impair science performance. Counter-stereotypic images were predicted to alleviate threat and enhance female performance.