I am not a robot
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The Wisdom of Psychopaths
In this engrossing journey into the lives of psychopaths and their infamously crafty behaviors, the renowned psychologist Kevin Dutton reveals that there is a...
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Recent reports of a mountain lion or cougar stalking the campus of the University of Iowa prompted campus jokesters to tweet their surprise that Michelle Bachman was in town. A cougar, colloquially, is an attractive older woman who seeks out trysts with younger men, and to some, it seems that Bachmann fits the bill. This emphasis on appearance is nothing new for high-profile women who are anything but homely, and feminist scholars are quick to point out its potential detrimental effects on perceptions of female competence.
Of course, we don’t need to consider reactions to political candidates to understand this idea. There is a well-known tension between seeing someone as, and appreciating them for, a body as opposed to a mind. At least, that’s what parents tell their daughters when their school clothes veer too far towards the revealing.
Science has backed parents up on this. A recent study found that showing men pictures of sexualized women evokes less activity in areas of the brain responsible for mental state attribution—that is, the area of the brain that becomes active when we think we are looking at an entity capable of thought and planned action. Other studies have found similar results. When men see body shots of women as compared with face shots, they judge women to be less intelligent, likeable, ambitious and competent.
A new study by Kurt Gray and colleagues in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, however, suggests that this kind of objectification might not cause perceivers to see women as mindless bodies but instead cause a transformation in the kind of minds that they perceive.
Research into mind perception has found two dimensions along which we tend to categorize others: agency (the capacity to act, plan) and experience (the capacity to feel emotions). A robot, for example, is high on the dimension of agency but low in experience. It can think, but it can’t feel. When we see flesh, on the other hand, we tend to see experience but not agency—an entity capable of pleasure and pain but not necessarily the sharpest or most useful tool in the shed.
So, objectification might not lead to perceptions of women as inanimate objects but as different kinds of humans—ones that are capable of feeling but not thinking. To test this hypothesis Gray et al. presented participants with images of individuals and varied the amount of flesh shown in the pictures (the amount of “body focus”). In line with their hypothesis, seeing full bodies, as compared to just faces, caused ratings of agency to diminish but ratings of experience to increase. The same was true when naked bodies were compared with clothed bodies. Indeed, as the sexual suggestiveness of the images increased, perceptions of agency decreased and perceptions of experience increased accordingly.
While this might initially seem modestly encouraging in that the objectified are perceived as humans and not objects, there is a disconcerting side effect of perceiving entities as high on experience—we see them as more capable of being harmed and, therefore, as more in need of protection. The researchers demonstrated this in a final study that showed participants are less willing to inflict painful shocks on half-naked individuals as compared to clothed individuals. It seems that when we see bodies we tend to also see potential victims. And though victimhood might be endearing to some, it certainly won’t help win elections.
Are you a scientist who specializes in neuroscience, cognitive science, or psychology? And have you read a recent peer-reviewed paper that you would like to write about? Please send suggestions to Mind Matters editor Gareth Cook, a Pulitzer prize-winning journalist at the Boston Globe. He can be reached at garethideas AT gmail.com or Twitter @garethideas.
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22 Comments
Add CommentTo me the evidence regarding clothed vs. naked bodies suggests that we see people more like animals when they are naked, and that we identify clothing with sophistication and humanity. This isn't really surprising, but it is important to verify and b aware of.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisInteresting and smart studies.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOn the applied side: unfortunately in countries such as italy being a naked woman can help you in the elections, for instance if you are a friend of Berlusconi
Sometime it could happen just the contrary: an object, like a photo of a naked woman, could stimulate our brain like it is a real woman. But in this case that brain can't think that a real woman is an object, perhaps even if she is naked!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis research is more story-telling than science. It starts with the folk-psychological idea of the objectification of women, and then projects that folk-psychology onto particular areas of the brain that correlate with various types of perceived images. It is an attempt to reify cultural ideas within neurons. The researcher collects data, but collecting data is not science. To hide this inadequacy from the public, the researcher shrouds the data in psycho-techno babble and with a compelling story that matches our preconceived cutural stereotypes. Most 'functional' neuroimaging is like this.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe study and comments certainly don't address the core issues or ideas that need to be considered. Generally, I don't find the study very interesting substantively. As an example of a not very useful study, perhaps.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt would have been more useful to first use the perspective of the human animal. The study's perspective of philosophy, psychology, feminism is silly. Try hard science like evolutionary biology to understand evolutionary concepts such as sexual selection (both from the male and female side), competition between males, and females for mates and general dominance, and use of subjects of older males/females where there is likely less emphasis on sexual selection per se.
Also, I found the use of photographs a problem -- not that there is a easy solution. Us animals do view others more holistically -- we react to real people, not pictures.
And get rid of the politics of objectification, sexism, agency, mind. That is, the first step in understanding humans is to accept that humans are the result of evolution and our basic instincts, such as being discussed here, are ingrained in our DNA.
To the extent that the research is valid, what does this say to the effectiveness of the "slutwalk" (see the Wikipedia entry for an overview) strategy for improving the place of women in society?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI tend to agree bestofnothing, the study also ignores our natural instincts for finding mates, and while there are men who tend to 'objectify' women this is not the case with all men. Some lesbian women can also be said to objectify women, just go to a female gay bar!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI can't deny my feelings for the attractiveness of the opposite sex and I refuse to categorise these feelings as culturally and socially inappropriate. And yes, there is more to a sexual partner than her sexual attributes but this aspect of partnering seems to be strangely missing from any scientific studies that I've come across. And no, I don't feel antagonistic toward feminists - I marched for women's rights back in the 60's.
Less of areas of brain activation will tend to focus both men and women into a domain we can name 'going out of the world' and that can lead to condition may be name as 'reaching to God'. By God I mean to say that 'one gets a feeling of not attached to worldly affairs', it happens as very little of brain area is activated. Parietal lobe refuses to process any further sensory input - is the idea?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere is nothing about Michelle Bachman to suggest she stalks younger men, although it's true she keeps her appearance up. I think this is called stereotyping. It also suggests a personal contempt for a female political candidate, presumably because of her values, opinions and beliefs. I'm not fond of the lady myself but there's no place for personal attacks of this kind in a science blog.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMen objectifying women in terms of their sexual attractiveness has a female equivalent behavior. It’s widely recognized now that women have an inborn tendency to be attracted to men with certain physical traits. You can call this "sexism" if you wish, but it seems to be a persistent human behavior for all of human existence.
The point here is that much of what was once thought to be bad manners or sexism is now acknowledged to be neurologically based. Maybe it's time to stop calling names and recognize that we are organisms with various tendencies that are natural and were widely accepted until the last 1% of human existence. Human beings are what they are and what you see is largely what you get.
It seems obvious now why women in Muslim countries cover their bodies in a burka to desexualize themselves, unlike women in predominantly Christian countries: Muslim women wish to be perceived as agents rather than objects.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPeople are primates first, humans second. The proof is all around you.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere is also a possibility that the reason why the test subjects viewed the more sexually suggestive women as less intelligent was a result of a conscious, well-thought determination: A woman willing to allow themselves to be seen in such a manner are more likely doing so because they are aren't able to be successful without resorting to using their sexuality as a tool.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf that is in fact the rationale going on in the test subjects' minds, however, it lends itself to be a product of societal mores and stereotypes as much as it would be a hard-wired brain phenomena.
Again just a theory, but as others have mentioned, with this kind of superficial testing methodology, it sounds as plausible.
I would like to tell all of you something. This article is the biggest piece of shit that I have ever read. How can you take this seriously? Half of this makes no sense. Let me inform all of you of something. The reason that you all think less of women who wear less clothes is because you are all sexist pigs! There are places in the world where women do not wear any type of clothes and the men do not think less of them. I can easily tell you why men think of women who wear less clothes as inferior. The reason is because of the patriarchal society that we live in. If you look at the media and studies like this women are just objectified. And unless studies like this don't stop them guess what? All of you men will continue to be sexist assholes who blame science and your brain for why you are like that. Which is like blaming your brain for racism. So you know what? I'm going to pull up my tight jeans and little tank top and go back to studying for one of my college midterms. Since guess what? Statistics say that there are more of me in college then you! And you can now make yourself your own sandwich!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe tendency of men to objectify women are well-known in evolutionary psychology. Men are attracted to sexy women because it is an indicator of good capability for sexual reproduction which is essential to survival.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMen don't have to do it consciously because it hardwired in their brain. A sexy waist to hips ratio indicates good child-bearing capability (easy delivery). Big breasts indicate good child-rearing capability (lots of milk).
Cougar women like young men because they are more capable of reproduction than older men. They have higher sperm count and better quality in general. While men and women are not always interested in reproduction, these behaviors are subconsciously programmed in our brain by evolution.
The simplest of things. Have you ever, researchers, listened to a group of girls discussing boys? What they look like, and so on? It seems that women are not allowed to be objectified by men, whereas it is totally acceptable for women to objectify men. This is just one of the assymetries of contemporary feminism. And to have brain research corroborate it is rather unscientific, since the aim of research should be objective. Of course men occasionally view women as objects (of desire, or…), but women also objectify men, and men also objectify men and women objectify women. After all, we are things that appear in each other's universe, so what's the big deal. At the same time as all of these objectifications are going on, we are also completely aware that those other things are people. So what is the problem? The problem is that of certain people who want to use their looks to their advantage, without this becoming a recognized fact. (Women, and men.)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI just could'nt help myself.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe whole premise of men viewing women as objects is based on feminist prejudice. It reveals a ridiculously superficial outlook on the sophisticated mating process of humans. It's time feminists quit blaming men for their ineptitudes and its time these shallow studies quit encouraging such concepts.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOkay, how do you explain Rosie O'Donnel or Rosanne Barr?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think those objects should stay less objectified.
"Our Brains"? How about "Men's Brains"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDon't be dissing Rosie O'Donnel you creep.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis "study" was very poorly done. First it starts with a severe gender bias by testing only men without ever controling for homosexuals, cultural bias, or gender differences (requires female participants and male subjects in equal measure to the ones that were included). Then it makes arbitrary conclusions without any attempt to understand why the results observed actually occured. That would require testing nonhuman life forms to see if they get the same reaction.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPersonally, I am prone to the bias that anyone wearing inadequate clothing is less intelligent and those adequately clothed are more intelligent regardless of gender.
Let me inform you of something: Bad grammar and insulting rants don't impress me. Maybe the reason you don't get respect is because you behave like a spoiled brat.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMy wife earned my respect by showing that she is my mental equal. She had her moments where she made mistakes or was selfish but so did I. The fact that you clearly objectify men as objects of opposition proves that there is really no difference between how male and female minds approach sexual opportunities.
PS. I make my own sandwiches because my arms aren't broken. It took years to convince her to stop being barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen. The only thing that worked was demanding that since the kids were older and in school all day she had to get a job. I married a partner not a damned slave.