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Women can resist the promotional effect of sexualized model through late cognitive reappraisal: evidence from the right f-LPP
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  • Zhennan Liu,
  • Haoyue Qian,
  • Yinying Hu,
  • Xiangping Gao
Zhennan Liu
Shanghai Normal University
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Haoyue Qian
Institute of Neuroscience, CAS Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
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Yinying Hu
Shanghai Normal University
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Xiangping Gao
Shanghai Normal University

Corresponding Author:[email protected]

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Abstract

Contemporary mass media frequently prioritizes the attractiveness of women’s sexual appearance over other attributes, which leads to the viewing of women as sex objects (i.e., sexual objectification) and even, women’s objectification of themselves (i.e., self-objectification). Nevertheless, some women, especially those with low self-objectification trait, could escape the influence of sexual objectifying propaganda. The present study investigated whether and how these women overcome the promotion of sexualized model and the associated neural activities using EEG approach. The behavioral results showed that compared to sportswear, swimsuits significantly increased the perception model’s attractiveness (i.e., the promotional effect of sexual objectification), while this increase was significantly smaller in women with low self-objectification than in those with medium and high self-objectification. EEG results revealed that attractiveness perception of swimsuit model specifically induced a right frontal LPP, an ERP component associated with reappraisal, and this LPP increased pronouncedly in women with low self-objectification but not in those with high self-objectification. Furthermore, a correlation between LPP amplitude and perceived attractiveness of sexualized models was found in women with low self-objectification. These results suggest that women, especially those with low self-objectification, can resist the promotion of sexualized models through late-stage cognitive regulation, i.e., cognitive reappraisal.