Turkish Test-Mirror Testing

Academia has celebrated, over the years, the Mirror Test (and, unrelated but equally colorful, the Marshmallow Test). Now comes Turkish Test-Mirror Testing, which virtually enhances confidence, to some degree, that students taking tests virtually are genuinely being tested on their own merits and so will be justifiably able to be passed onward by the university […]

Budgie Mirror Mystery (study)

  “Mirrors or mirror-related toys are often provided to Budgerigars as a substitute for social interactions with a plethora of different mirror toys available for purchase. Despite widespread use, exactly how mirrors relate to social behaviors (i.e. actions directed towards conspecifics within a flock) remains a mystery in Budgerigars.” That’s to say, with reference to […]

Eating Popcorn in Front of a Mirror May Induce Some People to Eat More Popcorn

Eating popcorn in front of a mirror is a provocative act — provoking the urge to eat more popcorn — suggests this study: “The ‘Social’ Facilitation of Eating Without the Presence of Others: Self-reflection on Eating Makes Food Taste Better and People Eat More,” Ryuzaburo Nakata and Nobuyuki Kawai, Physiology and Behavior, epub 2017. The […]

A wokfull of cockroaches – observing observers

The facial analysis system behind the recently featured ‘Laughing Mirror‘was developed by the Dutch firm VicarVision [* see note below] A description of their system, called ‘FaceReader ™ ‘ was published in Proceedings of Measuring Behavior, 2005 (Wageningen, 30 August – 2 September 2005) ‘The FaceReader: Online facial expression recognition‘ Since then the computer code has […]