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Kissing Right? Absence of Rightward Directional Turning Bias During First Kiss Encounters Among Strangers

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Kissing Right? Absence of Rightward Directional Turning Bias During First Kiss Encounters Among Strangers Journal of Nonverbal Behavior https://doi.org/10.1007/s10919-019-00300-7 ORIGINAL PAPER Kissing Right? Absence of Rightward Directional Turning Bias During First Kiss Encounters Among Strangers Jennifer R. Sedgewick1 · Abby Holtslander1 · Lorin J. Elias1 © The Author(s) 2019 Abstract When leaning toward a partner for a kiss, the direction that individuals turn their head when planting the kiss is found to vary based on the kiss’s context; romantic kissing between adult couples is consistently directed rightward, though recently, a non-romantic kiss between parent–child couples was observed to be leftward. The current study further examines the lateral head-turning direction between non-romantic couples using a novel context: a frst kiss between strangers. Observing strangers kissing was feasible due to a unique social media phenomenon; since 2014, 23 “First Kiss” online videos have emerged which depict kisses facilitated by the video’s director between consenting strangers. The turning direction of 230 kissing couples were coded from the 23 First Kiss videos, and the proportion of right to left turns were almost equal; 51% of couples displayed a right- turn kiss, and 49% conveyed a left-turn kiss. Further, the proportion of right and left turns observed from our sample of strangers kissing were compared to Güntürkün’s (in Nature 421:711, https ://doi.org/10.1038/42171 1a, 2003) original study that examined authentic kissing between adult couples. A signifcantly diferent turning bias was exhibited. Because the kissing criterion was parallel between these studies, our study demonstrates that the context infuenced the direction of bias, namely, that of a non-romantic kiss. We discuss the potential role of context and emotional lateralization on kissing laterality, and propose future directions to test these predictions. Keywords Head-turning · Kissing · Context · Bias · Asymmetry · Laterality Introduction From kicking a ball to choosing which hand to write with, humans demonstrate various lateral preferences that are performed more frequently to the left or right. Motor asym- metries that are most often cited are the predominant right-sidedness for hand, foot, and eye dominance, all of which are posited to arise from innate mechanisms (Kumar et al. 2010; Mandal et al. 1992). Recently, an equally persistent right-side lateral preference has * Lorin J. Elias [email protected] 1 Department of Psychology, University of Saskatchewan, 9 Campus Drive, Saskatoon, SK S7N 5A5, Canada Vol.:(0123456789)1 3 Journal of Nonverbal Behavior been identifed during head-turning behavior. Specifcally, when facing towards a romantic partner and leaning in for a kiss, individuals tend to tilt their head to the right when plant- ing the kiss more often than to the left. Head-turning biases during kissing were discovered by Güntürkün (2003) by observ- ing 124 lip-to-lip kisses between adult couples in public spaces (e.g., airport terminals, beaches, parks). From these observations, a disproportionate bias emerged; approximately 65% of couples turned to the right whereas 35% turned to the left. To eliminate the pos- sibility that kisser A could have subtly communicated to kisser B the direction of turn for this nonverbal behavior, further studies utilized a nonhuman kissing partner: a human-sized mannequin head (Barrett et al. 2006; Ocklenburg and Güntürkün 2009; van der Kamp and Canal-Bruland 2011). When observing individual rather than joint-action turning direc- tion, the head-turning bias persisted; 66% (Shaki 2013) to 81% (Barrett et al. 2006) of indi- viduals from Western cultures exhibited a right-turned kiss. Comparable to the theoretical mechanism guiding handedness, the right head-turning preference when kissing was speculated by Güntürkün (2003) to arise from an innate motor bias. This rationale was founded upon the observation that within the prenatal environ- ment, fetuses develop a lateralized head position preference beginning from 38 weeks of gestation; specifcally, the head tends to rest turned to the right as opposed to a mid-line position (Previc 1991; Ververs et al. 1994). After conception until approximately 3 months of age, a head position preference is also observed from infants’ posture when oriented on their backs (i.e., their supine posture; Hopkins et al. 1987; Rönnqvist and Hopkins 1998). Head-turning asymmetries are thus described to be transient. They are one of our frst observable motor preferences and disappear from typical developmental progress, but they are prominently displayed when leaning in for a kiss. The congenital hypothesis has been the predominant theory for kissing laterality, though recent investigations challenge this theory. For instance, if the right-turn preference did arise from an innate mechanism, we would expect this directionality to persist across cul- tures akin to the right-side prevalence of handedness (Ardila et al. 1989; Dragovic 2004; Gilbert and Wysocki 1992). However, this is not the case. Shaki (2013) demonstrated that visuospatial habits guided by one’s native reading direction infuenced the directionality of bias. By conducting the study in geographic locations with ofcial languages that read from left-to-right (Italian, English) and right-to-left (Hebrew, Arabic), a reversed bias was evident from both authentic kissing and on a mannequin-kissing task: left-to-right read- ing cultures displayed a right-turn bias, whereas right-to-left readers displayed a left-turn bias. Shaki (2013) also examined the correlation between turning preference and handed- ness, footedness, and eyedness, as these motor biases tend to exhibit a consistent direc- tional pattern (Kumar et al. 2010; Mandal et al. 1992). Although a signifcant correlation was reported from Ocklenburg and Güntürkün (2009), the results from Shaki mirrored those from previous research by van der Kamp and Canal-Bruland (2011) and Barrett et al. (2006) which found no correlation between head-turning preference and innate motor biases. If native reading direction were only a moderator of an innate head-turning bias, we should expect the right-side preference from left-to-right reading cultures to transcend kissing contexts, comparable to how individuals who use their right hand to write with a pen typically use the same hand to manipulate a paintbrush (Elias et al. 1998). Again, this is not the case. Sedgewick and Elias (2016) introduced a novel lip-kissing context: a kiss shared between a parent and child. Images of parent–parent kissing (romantic context) and parent–child kissing (parental context) couples were collected and coded for the direction of head-turn. Both contexts were considered to be emotional in their intent, but difered in 1 3 Journal of Nonverbal Behavior their romantic motivation. The consistent right-turn bias was observed from kissers in the romantic context, though a left-turn bias was found for parent–child kissing partners. These fndings demonstrate that contextual factors guided by the emotional intent of the kiss may play a role in the direction of lateral bias. Although the assumption of kissing laterality originating from an innate mechanism is a logical prediction, the extant literature suggests that other factors contribute to the non- verbal communication of kissing. The purpose of the present study is to further explore the infuence of kissing context, and specifcally, between adult dyads. Although adults have several conventions of kissing, such as when greeting friends, within religious rituals, or when displaying afection, our context of interest is for a particularly novel one: a frst kiss between strangers. The possibility of analyzing this obscure scenario was feasible due to a social media phenomenon stemming from one viral video. In March 2014, New York clothing company Wren released a short flm entitled First Kiss. Directed by Tatia Pllieva, First Kiss displays 20 unacquainted individuals who have consented to be randomly paired with each other to engage in a frst kiss. The initiation of each kiss is captured, thus illustrating precisely the direction that individuals turn when approaching their partner. As one would imagine when kissing a stranger, the body lan- guage revealed is often awkward, though surprisingly for some couples, quite passionate (see Fig. 1 for illustrated examples). Prior to this study, 23 frst kiss videos were available on the popular online video-sharing website, YouTube. Although we are trusting that these kisses are in fact between strangers and not actors, the opportunity to examine frst kiss encounters has become a possibility because of this unique data driven by social media. The First Kiss videos comprise the content of our analysis, to which the purpose of using this content is to examine the lateral turning direction of strangers engaging in a frst kiss. This scenario is shared between adult couples, parallel to the kissing dyads from pre- vious research, and kisses are qualifed using comparable criteria: lip-contact, positioned face-to-face, and the absence of hand-held objects (Güntürkün 2003; Shaki 2013). Inves- tigating strangers kissing is a departure from the previous studies in that it can simulta- neously examine (1) a context whereby the motivation to deliver a quality kiss is likely decreased in comparison to kissing a romantically-desired partner, and (2) kisses are between individuals with no prior kissing habits established with each other. We presume a lack of emotional intention behind the kiss due to the artifciality of the scenario, as the Fig. 1 Film stills from First Kiss. As conveyed by the body language, the images from left to right illustrate a passionate and awkward kissing interaction, respectively. Presented images were collected from the origi- nal First Kiss video: https ://www.youtu be.com/watch ?v=IpbDH xCV29 A 1 3 Journal of Nonverbal Behavior couples are not only strangers but also do not get to voluntarily choose their kissing part- ner. Kisses from previous studies were assumed to be of a romantic type because they were described to be between adults, on the lips, and from regions where lip-kissing is not typi- cally performed as a social gesture.
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