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- Investigating inattentional blindness through the lens of fear chemosignalsPublication . Semin, Gün R.; DePhillips, Michael; Gomes, NunoInattentional blindness is a phenomenon wherein people fail to perceive obvious stimuli within their vision, sometimes leading to dramatic consequences. Research on the effects of fear chemosignals suggests that they facilitate receivers’ sensory acquisition. We aimed to examine the interplay between these phenomena, investigating whether exposure to fear chemosignals (vs. rest body odors) can reduce the inattentional-blindness handicap. Utilizing a virtual-reality aquarium,we asked participants to count how many morsels a school of fish consumedwhile two unexpected stimuli swam by. We predicted that participants exposed to fear chemosignals (N =131) would detect unexpected stimuli significantly more often than participants exposed to rest body odors (N =125). All participants were adult Portuguese university students aged 18 to 40 years. The results confirmed our hypothesis, χ2 (1) = 6.10,p = .014, revealing that exposure to fear chemosignals significantly increased the detection of unexpected stimuli by about 10%. The implications of our findings open a novel avenue for reducing the adverse consequences of inattentional blindness
- The function of fear chemosignals: Preparing for dangerPublication . Gomes, Nuno; Semin, Gün R.It has been shown that the presence of conspecifics modulates human's vigilance strategies as is the case with animal species. Mere presence has been found to reduce vigilance. However, animal research has also shown that chemosignals (e.g., sweat) produced during fear-inducing situations modulates individuals' threat detection strategies. In the case of humans, little is known about how exposure to conspecifics' fear chemosignals modulates vigilance and threat detection effectiveness. The present study (N= 59) examined how human fear chemosignals affect vigilance strategies and threat avoidance in its receivers. We relied on a paradigm that simulates a "foraging under threat" situation in the lab, integrated with an eye-tracker to examine the attention allocation. Our results showed that the exposure to fear chemosignals (vs. rest chemosignals and a no-sweat condition) while not changing vigilance behavior leads to faster answers to threatening events. In conclusion, fear chemosignals seem to constitute an important warning signal for human beings, possibly leading its receiver to a readiness state that allows faster reactions to threat-related events.