Marine Taffou

• PhD
• Researcher at Armed Forces Biomedical Research Institute, France

Auditory roughness elicits aversion, and higher activation in cerebral areas involved in threat processing, but its link with defensive behavior is unknown. Defensive behaviors are triggered by intrusions into the space immediately surrounding the body, called peripersonal space (PPS). Integrating multisensory information in PPS is crucial to assur...

The perception of space. The experiencing of experience Man does not perceive reality but what the brain manages to reconstruct from the information that it receives from the various senses. However, these sensory inputs are ambiguous and are based on sensors with limited capacities. Nevertheless, humans generally manage to successfully represent t...

Introduction Avec plus de 14 000 nouveaux cas par an en France, le mélanome a une incidence qui ne cesse d’augmenter. L’exposition solaire, en particulier dans l’enfance, est un des principaux facteurs de risque modifiables de mélanome. Plusieurs études ont montré l’importance de mettre en place des actions de prévention visant les enfants dès leu...

Background: Humans perceive near space and far space differently. Peripersonal space (PPS), i.e. the space directly surrounding the body, is often studied using paradigms based on auditory-tactile integration. In these paradigms, reaction time (RT) to a tactile stimulus is measured in the presence of a concurrent auditory looming stimulus. New me...

Background: Humans perceive near space and far space differently. Peripersonal space, i.e. the space directly surrounding the body, is often studied using paradigms based on auditory-tactile integration. In these paradigms, reaction time to a tactile stimulus is measured in the presence of a concurrent auditory looming stimulus. New Method: We prop...

Multisensory integration of stimuli occurring in the area surrounding our bodies gives rise to the functional representation of peripersonal space (PPS). PPS extent is flexible according to the affective context and the target of an action, but little is known about how social context modulates it. We used an audiotactile interaction task to invest...

The space immediately surrounding our bodies, i.e., peripersonal space (PPS), is a critical area for the interaction with the external world, be it to deal with imminent threat or to attain objects of interest. In the brain, a dedicated system codes PPS in motor terms for the purpose of action. Yet, humans have asymmetric motor abilities: the domin...

Affect, space, and multisensory integration are processes that are closely linked. However, it is unclear whether the spatial location of emotional stimuli interacts with multisensory presentation to influence the emotional experience they induce in the perceiver. In this study, we used the unique advantages of virtual reality techniques to present...

Virtual Reality (VR) displays have been developed for years; lots of technological challenges are still remaining to improve presence and hopefully avoid oculomotor trouble, eyestrain and sickness. Although the technology is not mature enough to avoid discomfort, the market already proposes devices to a large public, especially head-mounted devices...

Judging the size of a group of people is an everyday task, on which many decisions are based. In the present study, we investigated whether judgment of size of different groups of people depended on whether they were presented through the auditory channel, through the visual channel, or through both auditory and visual channels. Groups of humanoids...

Sounds in our environment like voices, animal calls or musical instruments are easily recognized by human listeners. Understanding the key features underlying this robust sound recognition is an important question in auditory science. Here, we studied the recognition by human listeners of new classes of sounds: acoustic and auditory sketches, sound...

Sounds in our environment like voices, animal calls, or musical instruments can be recognized on the basis of timbre alone. The objective of this study was to unravel the features underlying this robust sound recognition. We investigated how severely sounds can be simplified while still being recognizable. A large number of natural sounds were simp...

Fear of crowds is a symptom found in agoraphobia (among others) and which has both visual and auditory relevant components. In order to examine the potential interest of auditory-visual virtual reality to treat fear of crowds, we investigated the efficiency of an auditory-visual virtual environment in evoking affective reaction. We conducted an eva...

This questionnaire comprises 15 items describing common crowded situations and addressing different aspects of an encounter with a crowd such as the sensory modalities through which the crowd is sensed (auditory, visual, and/or tactile stimulation) or the mobility of the crowd (fixed in space as when “standing in a crowded bus” or in movement as wh...

In a natural environment, affective events often convey emotional cues through multiple sensory modalities. Yet, the effect of multisensory affective events on the conscious emotional experience (feelings) they induce remains relatively undiscovered. The present research exploited the unique advantages of virtual reality techniques to examine the n...

Peri-personal space (PPS) is defined as the space immediately surrounding our bodies, which is critical in the adaptation of our social behavior. As a space of interaction with the external world, PPS is involved in the control of motor action as well as in the protection of the body. The boundaries of this PPS are known to be flexible but so far,...

Our preferences are sensitive to social influences. For instance, we like more the objects that are looked-at by others than non-looked-at objects. Here, we explored this liking effect, using a modified paradigm of attention cueing by gaze. First, we investigated if the liking effect induced by gaze relied on motoric representations of the target o...

Centuries ago, western philosophers of art proposed that an artifact may express emotion. The much older tradition of Chinese calligraphy and landscape painting sees in the brushstroke a central element of the emotional expressiveness of pictorial art. How emotion is detected and perceived from artwork is a current subject of exploration in psychol...

In a natural environment, affective information is perceived via multiple senses, mostly audition and vision. However, the impact of multisensory information on affect remains relatively undiscovered. In this study, we investigated whether the auditory-visual presentation of aversive stimuli influences the experience of fear. We used the advantages...

Cynophobia (dog phobia) has both visual and auditory relevant components. In order to investigate the efficacy of virtual reality (VR) exposure-based treatment for cynophobia, we studied the efficiency of auditory-visual environments in generating presence and emotion. We conducted an evaluation test with healthy participants sensitive to cynophobi...