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Published on: August 27, 2021
Semantic conditioning of salivary pH for communication
Carolin A Ruf1, Daniele De Massari, Franziska Wagner-Podmaniczky
1Institute of Medical Psychology and Behavioral Neurobiology, University of Tübingen, Silcherstr. 5, 72076 Tübingen, Germany.
Objectives:
Semantic conditioning of salivary pH was investigated as a new paradigm for binary communication.
Methods And Materials:
In a sample of eleven healthy participants, affirmation or negation of presented statements were paired with milk and lemon to condition changes in salivary pH level.
Results:
Significant differences between the conditioned reactions were found at the group level. However, the analysis of pH changes on single-subject level revealed significant differences between affirmative and negative responses to the presented statements only for isolated samples in few participants. When classifying a change in pH value of more than .01 as correct response to a statement, only responses to affirmative statements reached mean accuracies of more than 60%.
Conclusion:
Improvements in the paradigm are necessary before testing it with the critical target population of patients to prove its profit for basic yes/no communication in case no other reliable means of communication could be preserved.
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