Associations Between Pupillary Response Patterns to Emotional Faces and Self-Reported Social Anxiety
Date of Award
12-17-2019
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Department
Psychology
First Advisor
Erin Tone
Second Advisor
Vonetta Dotson
Third Advisor
Elizabeth Tighe
Abstract
The present study examined associations between self-reported social anxiety (SA) and patterns of pupillary response to emotional faces that provided feedback to college student participants (n = 59) about their performance on a reaction time task. I hypothesized that self-reported SA would predict pupil dilation profile (peak, duration, and latency) in response to feedback stimuli of varying intensities (i.e., low vs. high intensity happy and angry). Results showed no evidence of significant associations between peak and sustained pupil diameter measures and SA; however, at 0.5 seconds post-stimulus onset, SA and pupil diameter were negatively associated, such that smaller pupil diameter was associated with higher levels of SA. This pattern could be consistent with a blunted autonomic response to affective cues; examination of concurrent eye-tracking data would provide a test of this possibility. The present study lays crucial groundwork for future assessments utilizing pupil diameter as a parsimonious tool.
DOI
https://doi.org/10.57709/15928555
Recommended Citation
Fernandes, Mary, "Associations Between Pupillary Response Patterns to Emotional Faces and Self-Reported Social Anxiety." Thesis, Georgia State University, 2019.
doi: https://doi.org/10.57709/15928555
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