Research has identified Northwest Turkey as a key region for the development of dairying inthe seventh millennium BCE, yet little is known about how this practice began or evolvedthere. This... Show moreResearch has identified Northwest Turkey as a key region for the development of dairying inthe seventh millennium BCE, yet little is known about how this practice began or evolvedthere. This research studies Barcın Ho¨yu¨ k, a site located in Bursa’s Yenişehir Valley, whichranges chronologically from 6600 BCE, when the first evidence of settled life appears in theMarmara Region, to 6000 BCE, when Neolithic habitation at the site ceases. Using potterysherds diagnostic by vessel category and type, this paper aims at identifying which onesmay have been primarily used to store, process, or consume dairy products. Organic residueanalysis of selected samples helped address the process of adoption and intensificationof milk processing in this region over time. The lipid residue data discussed in this paperderive from 143 isotopic results subsampled from 173 organic residues obtained from 805Neolithic potsherds and suggest that bowls and four-lugged pots may have been preferredcontainers for processing milk. The discovery of abundant milk residues even among theearliest ceramics indicates that the pioneer farmers arrived in the region already with theknowhow of dairying and milk processing. In fact, these skills and the reliance on secondaryproducts may have given them one of the necessary tools to successfully venture into theunfarmed lands of Northwest Anatolia in the first place. Show less
ObjectivesSocial anxiety has long been related to reduced eye contact. The present study aimed to determine whether gaze avoidance by more socially anxious individuals is a habit (related to social... Show moreObjectivesSocial anxiety has long been related to reduced eye contact. The present study aimed to determine whether gaze avoidance by more socially anxious individuals is a habit (related to social anxiety) or a momentary effect of state anxiety in a face-to-face conversation. Meanwhile, this study investigated the effect of conversational role and partner gaze direction on gaze behaviour during the conversation.MethodsParticipants (N = 61, age-range 17-30 years, 89% female) had a getting acquainted conversation with a same-sex confederate for approximately 10 minutes. We alternated conversational roles (talking vs. listening) and manipulated the confederate’s gaze direction (direct vs. averted). Participants’ gaze behaviour was registered with eye-tracking glasses. Their social anxiety and state anxiety were measured using questionnaires.ResultsThe results revealed greater state anxiety was associated with reduced eye gaze throughout the conversation whereas no effect of social anxiety was found. Furthermore, the results showed that the negative association between state anxiety and eye gaze was particularly strong when the confederate directly looked at the participant and also when the participant was talking. In addition, the study found main and interaction effects of conversational role and partner gaze direction on eye gaze behaviour during the conversation.ConclusionsTogether, the current results shed light on factors that influence eye gaze behaviour in a face-to-face social setting and provide initial evidence that, in the general population, eye gaze avoidance is more related to heightened state anxiety than to social anxiety. Show less
Fasya, E.L.; Bos, E. van den; Heylen, D.K.J.; Kret, M.E. 2023
Background: Social anxiety has long been related to reduced eye contact, and this feature is seen as a causal and a maintaining factor of social anxiety disorder. The present research adds to the... Show moreBackground: Social anxiety has long been related to reduced eye contact, and this feature is seen as a causal and a maintaining factor of social anxiety disorder. The present research adds to the literature by investigating the relationship between social anxiety and visual avoidance of faces in a reciprocal face-to-face conversation, while taking into account two aspects of conversations as potential moderating factors: conversational role and level of intimacy. Method: Eighty-five female students (17-25 years) completed the Leibowitz Social Anxiety Scale and had a face-to-face getting-acquainted conversation with a female confederate. We alternated conversational role (talking versus listening) and manipulated intimacy of the topics (low versus high). Participants' gaze behavior was registered with Tobii eye-tracking glasses. Three dependent measures were extracted regarding fixations on the face of the confederate: total duration, proportion of fixations, and mean duration. Results: The results revealed that higher levels of social anxiety were associated with reduced face gaze on all three measures. The relation with total fixation duration was stronger for low intimate topics. The relation with mean fixation duration was stronger during listening than during speaking. Conclusion: The results highlight the importance of studying gaze behavior in a naturalistic social interaction. Show less
Chen, J.; Bos, E. van den; Velthuizen, S.L.M.; Westenberg, P.M. 2021
Patients with social anxiety disorder appear to display aberrant gaze behavior across a variety of social situations. In contrast, the gaze behavior of high socially anxious (HSA) individuals from... Show morePatients with social anxiety disorder appear to display aberrant gaze behavior across a variety of social situations. In contrast, the gaze behavior of high socially anxious (HSA) individuals from the community seems to depend on the type of situation and the aberration might be limited to gaze avoidance. This study investigated the differential effect of social situation-a face-viewing task and a public speaking task-on gaze behavior in HSA participants from a community sample. Participants' eye movements were tracked using a wearable eye tracker. Two aspects of gaze behavior were measured: (1) gaze avoidance was assessed by total fixation time, fixation counts, and mean fixation time on faces; (2) hypervigilance was assessed by scan path length and mean distance between fixations. The results confirmed a moderating effect of task on total (though not mean) fixation time on faces and fixation counts. Compared to low socially anxious participants, HSA participants looked less frequently (hence shorter) at the audience during the speech only. This indicates that visual avoidance in HSA individuals does not occur by default, but only when risks of (negative) social consequences are perceived. High and low socially anxious participants showed no difference in hypervigilance in either situation. Show less
Bos, E. van den; Rooij, M. de; Sumter, S.R.; Westenberg, P.M. 2016
In the contextual cueing paradigm, Endo and Takeda (in Percept Psychophys 66:293-302, 2004) provided evidence that implicit learning involves selection of the aspect of a structure that is most... Show moreIn the contextual cueing paradigm, Endo and Takeda (in Percept Psychophys 66:293-302, 2004) provided evidence that implicit learning involves selection of the aspect of a structure that is most useful to one's task. The present study attempted to replicate this finding in artificial grammar learning to investigate whether or not implicit learning commonly involves such a selection. Participants in Experiment 1 were presented with an induction task that could be facilitated by several characteristics of the exemplars. For some participants, those characteristics included a perfectly predictive feature. The results suggested that the aspect of the structure that was most useful to the induction task was selected and learned implicitly. Experiment 2 provided evidence that, although salience affected participants' awareness of the perfectly predictive feature, selection for implicit learning was mainly based on usefulness. Show less
