The effect of true and false feedback on blushing in women

Abstract

The effect of true and false feedback of facial blood flow on blushing and embarrassment was investigated in high (n=24) and low (n=24) scorers on the Blushing Propensity Scale. Feedback was given while the participants sang and read aloud. Blushing while singing habituated rapidly in both groups and was not affected by true feedback. Blushing still developed in high scorers when given false-negative feedback of blushing when they first sang, whereas low scorers did not blush. False-positive feedback of blushing while reading aloud increased embarrassment, but facial blood flow decreased. High scorers gave higher ratings for embarrassment and blushing than low scorers during most of the tasks. The findings suggest that people who think that they are prone to blushing feel more self-conscious but generally do not blush more intensely or frequently than people with low blushing propensity scores during clearly embarrassing or innocuous social encounters. However, expecting to blush might actually increase the likelihood of embarrassment and blushing in potentially embarrassing situations.

Introduction

Unwanted social attention is thought to be a potent stimulus for blushing (Leary, Britt, Cutlip & Templeton, 1992). Blushing intensifies if the blusher suspects that other people have noticed that they are blushing, presumably because blushing signals to others that the blusher has had a thought or experienced an emotion that he or she would prefer to keep hidden. Blushing is of far greater concern to some than it is to others; sometimes the fear of blushing becomes so problematic that it limits the range of activities in which the blusher is willing to participate, and occasionally it develops into full-blown social phobia.

To investigate the source of individual differences in blushing, Leary and Meadows (1991) introduced the concept of blushing propensity, a self-reported estimate of the tendency to blush in various social situations. They reported that high scorers on the Blushing Propensity Scale also had high scores on various dimensions of social anxiety, a finding which has since been replicated (Bögels et al., 1996, Drummond, 1997, Edelmann and Skov, 1993, Neto, 1996).

Because the intention of the Blushing Propensity Scale is to document individual differences in blushing, one would expect that blushing would be greater in those with high than low scores. To date, however, this prediction has not been confirmed. For example, Mulkens, de Jong and Bögels (1997) measured cheek temperature and changes in cheek blood flow while female participants watched a videotape of themselves singing and while watching the shower murder scene from Hitchcock's movie “Psycho”. Increases in cheek temperature and blood flow were greater while watching the videotaped song than while watching the movie segment, irrespective of the participant's blushing propensity score. Importantly, however, participants with high scores on the Blushing Propensity Scale thought that they blushed more intensely and were more concerned about whether they had blushed than participants with low blushing propensity scores. The intensity of blushing was also rated by two male confederates who formed an audience for the videotaped song. The confederates’ ratings of blushing intensity were similar for participants with high and low blushing propensity scores; however, the ratings may not have been particularly accurate because they were unrelated to changes in cheek blood flow or temperature. Mulkens, de Jong, Dobbelaar and Bögels (1999) recently investigated whether women who were afraid of blushing would blush more than others who were not afraid of blushing under conditions of high and low social stress (watching a videotape of themselves singing or watching a test pattern with two male confederates). Increases in facial temperature and cheek coloration were similar in both groups in both experimental conditions, but women who were afraid of blushing thought that they blushed far more intensely than the low-fear group.

Findings similar to those of Mulkens et al., 1997, Mulkens et al., 1999 were obtained in a study in our laboratory which involved measuring changes in forehead blood flow while participants sang a children's song (Drummond, 1997a). Forehead blood flow increased to the same extent during the song in high and low scorers on the Blushing Propensity Scale, despite higher ratings of embarrassment in high scorers. Taken together, the findings of Mulkens et al., 1997, Mulkens et al., 1999, Drummond, 1997 indicate that the intensity of blushing during embarrassment is unrelated to blushing propensity ratings. Whether high scorers on the Blushing Propensity Scale actually blush more frequently than low scorers because they are more easily embarrassed has not been established. Thus, it is possible that blushing propensity ratings reflect a concern about blushing rather than documenting individual differences in the intensity or frequency of blushing.

People often blush when they are told that they are blushing. For example, Leary et al. (1992) reported that facial temperature increased in over 50% of subjects when the experimenter inferred that the subject had started to blush. If blushing is considered to be a sign of weakness, being told that one is blushing is analogous to being told that one's social performance is inadequate. This might provoke sufficient embarrassment to induce blushing. Since high scorers on the Blushing Propensity Scale typically are frightened of blushing (Mulkens et al., 1997), they may blush more readily when informed that they are blushing than others with low scores. Conversely, being told that they are not blushing could limit the development of embarrassment and blushing during otherwise embarrassing encounters.

The aim of the present study was to investigate triggers of blushing in people with high scores on the Blushing Propensity Scale. Specifically, it was hypothesized that: (1) physiological signs of blushing and self-ratings of blushing and embarrassment would intensify when high scorers were given true feedback of changes in facial blood flow during an embarrassing task (singing a children's song), whereas feedback would not influence blushing or ratings in low scorers; (2) physiological signs of blushing and self-ratings of blushing and embarrassment would be minimal in all subjects during singing when they were given feedback that they were not blushing; (3) embarrassment and physiological signs of blushing would develop in high but not low scorers when they were given feedback that they were blushing during the otherwise innocuous task of reading neutral material aloud; and (4) that physiological signs of blushing would be greater in high than low scorers during a social encounter that should provoke little or no embarrassment in most people (answering questions about age, height, weight and medication intake).