HIGH BLUSHING PROPENSITY - FEARFUL PREOCCUPATION OR FACIAL COLORATION

Twenty-seven women with high scores on the Blushing Propensity Scale ( BPS) and 26 women with low BPS scores were exposed to two different Vi deo segments. One video showed the subject's own singing, recorded in a previous session and the other video showed a segment of Hitchcock's movie Psyche. During the experiment, facial coloration, facial temper ature, and skin conductance level were measured. In addition, subjects ' blushing intensity was judged by raters. Finally, subjects were aske d to rate their blushing intensity and fear of blushing during the vid eo presentations. Subjects generally blushed more during the presentat ion of their singing than during comparison stimulation, as measured p hysiologically. There were no between group differences in this respec t. No differences were found between the two groups on raters' judgeme nts about blushing intensity. However, high BPS subjects dramatically overestimated their blushing intensity and were more afraid of blushin g than low BPS subjects. During the mere presence of the raters, high BPS subjects tended to show a relatively strong coloration. Thus, the BPS seems to reflect both a fearful preoccupation and a stronger facia l coloration. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.