Vicarious viewing time: prolonged response latencies for sexually attractive targets as a function of task- or...

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Forensic Psychology
• Cognitive Science

Background:

• Viewing time for sexually appealing images is longer.
• Response latencies are increasingly used as diagnostic tools in forensic settings.
• The underlying processes driving longer viewing times for attractive targets are not fully understood.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the underlying processes of longer viewing times for sexually attractive targets.
• To disentangle task-specific and stimulus-specific contributions to viewing time effects.
• To assess the influence of assigned perspective on viewing time measures of sexual interest.

Main Methods:

• An adapted viewing time paradigm was employed.
• Participants rated the sexual attractiveness of target persons from assigned perspectives (heterosexual and homosexual for both sexes).
• This vicarious viewing time paradigm estimated independent contributions of task and stimuli.

Main Results:

• A significant task-based effect on viewing time was observed.
• A smaller, but still present, stimulus-based effect was also found.
• Viewing time patterns were significantly influenced by the assigned judging perspective.

Conclusions:

• Response latency patterns in sexual interest assessments can be biased by the judging perspective.
• The task (assigned perspective) has a larger impact on viewing time than the stimulus itself.
• Consideration of perspective bias is essential when using viewing time measures for assessing sexual interest.