Eye'm lovin' it! The role of gazing awareness in mimetic desires

Abstract

Evaluative learning Attitude formation dual models Effect of attention on affectRecent studies showed that people evaluate objects more favorably when these objects are gazed-at by others, an effect coined as "mimetic desire". In two studies, we tested whether mimetic desire stems from an automatic form of learning by examining one dimension of automaticity, i.e., people's awareness of the objectgaze association. Participants saw 6 neutral art paintings associated with a female gazing toward two of the paintings, away from two of the paintings, and closing her eyes with respect to the last two paintings. After the exposition phase, participants evaluated the paintings and performed a contingency-awareness test. Importantly, participants' responses on this test were genuinely driven by memory and not by inferences from liking. Results show that participants preferred objects that were gazed-at but only when they were aware of the object-gaze association. Hence, despite the adaptive function of joint attention, its impact on valence acquisition does not seem to qualify as an implicit learning process.

Approach–Avoidance Training Effects Are Moderated by Awareness of Stimulus–Action Contingencies

“…This conclusion contradicts the prevailing view concerning the automaticity of AA training effects and challenges theories that attribute AA training effects to the automatic acquisition of associations. These results add to recent work showing that various evaluative learning effects which were traditionally assumed to rely on automatic processes strongly depend on awareness (e.g., EC: Hofmann et al, 2010; the mere exposure effect: de Zilva, Vu, Newell, & Pearson, 2013; mimetic desires: Bry, Treinen, Corneille, & Yzerbyt, 2011). They provide support for recent theoretical accounts that question the involvement of an automatic association-formation mechanism in evaluative learning (e.g., De Houwer, 2009;Mitchell et al, 2009).…”

Judgments at Gaze Value: Gaze Cuing in Banner Advertisements, Its Effect on Attention Allocation and Product Judgments

“…While these findings are very promising, they have failed to address the evaluative importance of gaze information even though the positive impact of gaze on the evaluation of gazed-at objects has repeatedly been observed in previous studies (Bayliss et al, 2006, 2007; Corneille et al, 2009; Van der Weiden et al, 2010; Bry et al, 2011). Evaluative effects of gaze are, however, of major significance in an advertising context where positive evaluations of and interest in the advertised product are typically the primary goal.…”

“…Third, in light of the finding that social gaze can impact the evaluation of objects that are looked at (e.g., Bayliss et al, 2006), it is conceivable that faces displaying dynamic gaze movements toward an advertised product counteract the negative consequences of banner animation on product evaluations that have been observed in the past (Sundar and Kim, 2005). In fact, Bry et al (2011) argue that the effects of gaze direction on object desirability should be highest when individuals are aware of the association between the gaze and the gazed-at object. It is likely that such an association will be highest for dynamic gaze cues that engage the observer before moving toward the object.…”

How attention gates social interactions

“…Further, others’ ability to see the environment also appears to be important for determining the extent to which a gaze cue is interpreted as conveying intentional gaze–object relationships, with attentional responses to social cues being reduced when those relationships are absent or weakened . As a consequence, gaze cues directed toward occluded objects are often interpreted as not conveying social meaning, with the observer ceasing to experience typical gaze‐induced object preferences . This behavior may be explained by the attribution of an intention to attend to specific objects, as, for example, nonsocial arrow cues have been shown to elicit a general location bias toward parts of the environment, while gaze cues have been shown to elicit spatial‐orienting effects toward a specific object location .…”