Online Avatars Convey User Personality Traits

The Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin published a study that looked at what personality traits of a person's online avatar are conveyed to others.

Avatars are digital image or character created as an online representation of a user. Avatars can be simple cartoon drawings or complex 3D characters like those in online games like World of Warcraft or The Sims.

In the study, the researchers wanted to assess the avatars on five major traits: openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. They noted that some personality traits are better relayed than others. An outgoing or anxious person was easier to perceive based on the avatar compared to how open one is to new experiences or conscientious the person is.

They also noticed that a user with an avatar that has open eyes and a non-neutral expression is more likely to be agreeable and friendly. Avatars with a neutral expression are less likely to show friendship intentions.

The avatars used in the study are basic and simple. Researchers are cautious to extend their findings to cover more complex and dynamic characters such as the 3D models in virtual worlds.The study does show that avatars can offer accurate information about the creator's personality, and individuals high in agreeableness tend to create an avatar that others want to befriend--not unlike the real-world

Largest Scientific Study on Effectiveness of Online Video Advertising Presented at Internet Conference

University of Massachusetts Amherst presented a study on the effectiveness of video advertising as an economic, sustainable and profitable media platform. The study covered 275 million ads from in 367 million videos. With over 3,000 publishers and 65 million viewers, this study is the largest ever done on video advertising.

UMass researchers used Akamai's media analytics platform to study a 15 day period in April 2013 of anonymized viewer data to come up with their observation.

The study noted several factors such as the duration of the ad, where the ad is inserted, and viewer behavior while the ad is showing. It is even observed that weekend and evening viewing scored higher than regular days. Also, a 10 to 15 second fast loading video ad inserted in the middle of a video has a higher completion rate especially if the visitor is a repeat visitor on the site.

The findings of the study will be presented at the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Internet Measurement Conference in Barcelona.

Online video is one of the largest source of internet traffic and companies like YouTube are taking advantage of the opportunities it presents for advertising.

Psychoneuroimmunology - The Link Between Loneliness, Stress and The Immune System

A Recent study in psychoneuroimmunology has shown that there is a link between loneliness to a number of dysfunctional immune responses. The study suggests that being lonely can be harmful to ones health and well-being.

Psychoneuroimmunology or Psycho-neuro-immunology (PNI) is the study of the relationship between psychological activity and the nervous and immune systems of the human body. It integrates psychology, neurology, sociology, endocrinology and immunology and how these factors influence the immune system. Some studies even suggest that these changes affect the body at the molecular level.

PNI focuses mainly on the interactions of the nervous and immune system and the relationships between mental processes and health. Basically, PNI studies the relationip of how people think and feel and how it has a direct effect on how the immune systems function. It looks at the connection between behavior and health and tries to translate this into clinically relevant health applications.

The term, Psychoneuroimmunology or Psycho-neuro-immunology, was first used by Robert Ader and Nicholas Cohen at the University of Rochester in 1975. They conducted an experiment that showed that the nervous system can affect the immune system.

Studies Show That Brown Eyes Are Perceived To Be More Trustworthy Than Blue Eyes

A study on how the color of the eyes influence perception of trustworthiness showed that people tend to trust brown eyed people over the blue eyed.

The human brain interprets another person's face and expression to identify origin, emotional tendencies, health qualities, and some social information. This is called face perception. How the brain interprets the face would dictate how to socially interact with the person.

Face perception is domain specific, heritable and independent of the person's cognitive abilities. But it is influenced by environment, ethnicity, and to some extent, culture.

This process is highly adaptive in any social environment, especially for distinguishing a friend from a foe. Face perception provides information on the person's level of trustworthiness which helps the person succeed socially, economically, and in terms of extending his race, reproductively.

The amygdala (the part of the brain that is responsible for the "fight or flight" response) reacts to the information and sends the appropriate signal whether the person can be trusted or not. People with bilateral amygdala damage have problems judging a person's face and ultimately the person's trustworthiness.

The brain picks up many features of the face to process face perception. One part of the face that seems to have influence over how the face is interpreted are the eyes.