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Understanding the mechanisms behind the sexualized-body inversion hypothesis: The role of asymmetry and attention biases

A controversial hypothesis, named the Sexualized Body Inversion Hypothesis (SBIH), claims similar visual processing of sexually objectified women (i.e., with a focus on the sexual body parts) and inanimate objects as indicated by an absence of the inversion effect for both type of stimuli. The curre...

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Autores principales: Cogoni, Carlotta, Carnaghi, Andrea, Mitrovic, Aleksandra, Leder, Helmut, Fantoni, Carlo, Silani, Giorgia
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5886406/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29621249
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0193944
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author Cogoni, Carlotta
Carnaghi, Andrea
Mitrovic, Aleksandra
Leder, Helmut
Fantoni, Carlo
Silani, Giorgia
author_facet Cogoni, Carlotta
Carnaghi, Andrea
Mitrovic, Aleksandra
Leder, Helmut
Fantoni, Carlo
Silani, Giorgia
author_sort Cogoni, Carlotta
collection PubMed
description A controversial hypothesis, named the Sexualized Body Inversion Hypothesis (SBIH), claims similar visual processing of sexually objectified women (i.e., with a focus on the sexual body parts) and inanimate objects as indicated by an absence of the inversion effect for both type of stimuli. The current study aims at shedding light into the mechanisms behind the SBIH in a series of 4 experiments. Using a modified version of Bernard et al.´s (2012) visual-matching task, first we tested the core assumption of the SBIH, namely that a similar processing style occurs for sexualized human bodies and objects. In Experiments 1 and 2 a non-sexualized (personalized) condition plus two object-control conditions (mannequins, and houses) were included in the experimental design. Results showed an inversion effect for images of personalized women and mannequins, but not for sexualized women and houses. Second, we explored whether this effect was driven by differences in stimulus asymmetry, by testing the mediating and moderating role of this visual feature. In Experiment 3, we provided the first evidence that not only the sexual attributes of the images but also additional perceptual features of the stimuli, such as their asymmetry, played a moderating role in shaping the inversion effect. Lastly, we investigated the strategy adopted in the visual-matching task by tracking eye movements of the participants. Results of Experiment 4 suggest an association between a specific pattern of visual exploration of the images and the presence of the inversion effect. Findings are discussed with respect to the literature on sexual objectification.
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spelling pubmed-58864062018-04-20 Understanding the mechanisms behind the sexualized-body inversion hypothesis: The role of asymmetry and attention biases Cogoni, Carlotta Carnaghi, Andrea Mitrovic, Aleksandra Leder, Helmut Fantoni, Carlo Silani, Giorgia PLoS One Research Article A controversial hypothesis, named the Sexualized Body Inversion Hypothesis (SBIH), claims similar visual processing of sexually objectified women (i.e., with a focus on the sexual body parts) and inanimate objects as indicated by an absence of the inversion effect for both type of stimuli. The current study aims at shedding light into the mechanisms behind the SBIH in a series of 4 experiments. Using a modified version of Bernard et al.´s (2012) visual-matching task, first we tested the core assumption of the SBIH, namely that a similar processing style occurs for sexualized human bodies and objects. In Experiments 1 and 2 a non-sexualized (personalized) condition plus two object-control conditions (mannequins, and houses) were included in the experimental design. Results showed an inversion effect for images of personalized women and mannequins, but not for sexualized women and houses. Second, we explored whether this effect was driven by differences in stimulus asymmetry, by testing the mediating and moderating role of this visual feature. In Experiment 3, we provided the first evidence that not only the sexual attributes of the images but also additional perceptual features of the stimuli, such as their asymmetry, played a moderating role in shaping the inversion effect. Lastly, we investigated the strategy adopted in the visual-matching task by tracking eye movements of the participants. Results of Experiment 4 suggest an association between a specific pattern of visual exploration of the images and the presence of the inversion effect. Findings are discussed with respect to the literature on sexual objectification. Public Library of Science 2018-04-05 /pmc/articles/PMC5886406/ /pubmed/29621249 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0193944 Text en © 2018 Cogoni et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Cogoni, Carlotta
Carnaghi, Andrea
Mitrovic, Aleksandra
Leder, Helmut
Fantoni, Carlo
Silani, Giorgia
Understanding the mechanisms behind the sexualized-body inversion hypothesis: The role of asymmetry and attention biases
title Understanding the mechanisms behind the sexualized-body inversion hypothesis: The role of asymmetry and attention biases
title_full Understanding the mechanisms behind the sexualized-body inversion hypothesis: The role of asymmetry and attention biases
title_fullStr Understanding the mechanisms behind the sexualized-body inversion hypothesis: The role of asymmetry and attention biases
title_full_unstemmed Understanding the mechanisms behind the sexualized-body inversion hypothesis: The role of asymmetry and attention biases
title_short Understanding the mechanisms behind the sexualized-body inversion hypothesis: The role of asymmetry and attention biases
title_sort understanding the mechanisms behind the sexualized-body inversion hypothesis: the role of asymmetry and attention biases
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5886406/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29621249
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0193944
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