Attend or Defend? Sex Differences in Behavioral, Autonomic, and Respiratory Response Patterns to Emotion-Eliciting Films

Publication date: Available online 18 October 2017
Source:Biological Psychology
Author(s): Frank H. Wilhelm, Julina A. Rattel, Melanie Wegerer, Michael Liedlgruber, Simon Schweighofer, Sylvia D. Kreibig, Vitaliy Kolodyazhniy, Jens Blechert
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.



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