@article{ref1,
title="Attend or defend? Sex differences in behavioral, autonomic, and respiratory response patterns to emotion-eliciting films",
journal="Biological psychology",
year="2017",
author="Wilhelm, Frank H. and Blechert, Jens and Kolodyazhniy, Vitaliy and Kreibig, Sylvia D. and Schweighofer, Simon and Liedlgruber, Michael and Wegerer, Melanie and Rattel, Julina A.",
volume="130",
number="",
pages="30-40",
abstract="Sex differences in emotional reactivity have been studied primarily for negative but less so for positive stimuli; likewise, sex differences in the psychophysiological response-patterning during such stimuli are poorly understood. Thus, the present study examined sex differences in response to negative/positive and high/low arousing films (classified as threat-, loss-, achievement-, and recreation-related, vs. neutral films), while measuring 18 muscular, autonomic, and respiratory parameters. Sex differences emerged for all films, but were most prominent for threat-related films: Despite equivalent valence and arousal ratings, women displayed more facial-muscular and respiratory responding than men and pronounced sympathetic activation (preejection period, other cardiovascular and electrodermal measures), while men showed coactivated sympathetic/parasympathetic responding (including increased respiratory sinus arrhythmia). This indicates a prototypical threat-related defense response in women, while men showed a pattern of sustained orienting, which can be understood as a shift toward less threat proximity in the defense cascade model.<br><br>Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier B.V.<p /> <p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="0301-0511",
doi="10.1016/j.biopsycho.2017.10.006",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsycho.2017.10.006"
}