Quasiparticle Research Articles

Impact of Bell's palsy in facial emotion recognition: a prospective observational study of 60 patients.

Patients with Bell's palsy suffer from functional deficits and cannot convey their emotions through the face as well as they used to. According to embodied cognition, automatic mimicry and facial feedback modulate emotion perception. The aim of our study was to determine the impact of Bell's palsy on facial emotion perception. Facial motor skills, the use of botulinum toxin injections, and anxiety were studied. 60 patients completed Emotest-VA, an assessment tool of facial emotion perception, facial motor assessment and affective questionnaires. Facial perception scores of patients were compared to the normative data provided by Emotest-VA. Relationships between facial motor skills, anxiety and perceptual abilities were carried out with Pearson's correlations. Perception accuracy scores were abnormal in 12% of patients. Patients were more ambiguous than normative population to perceive emotion (t(23) = 4.14, p < .001). Happiness arousal was negatively correlated to smile asymmetry (n = 60, r=-.294 p = .022). Patients who received botulinum toxin were more accurate to perceive disgust (Z = 3.60, p < .001). State anxiety decreased when patients could improve their horizontal smile (r = - 440, p < .001). Bell's palsy impaired sensorimotor simulation, thereby reducing emotional contagion. Smile measures could indicate patients' recovery and patients' anxiety. It could also predict patient's perceptual abilities. These results provide new directions in the management of Bell's palsy. Additionally to physical therapy, it is relevant to improve emotional contagion both in its productive and perceptive aspects through facial feedback.

Catching on: Work stress, employee wellbeing, and the moderating role of team-level emotional contagion

Abstract Work stress and employee wellbeing have gained heightened attention since the COVID-19 pandemic. Until now, organizations have primarily sought to conceptualize these variables as an individual-level phenomenon; thereby neglecting the potential influence of social dynamics within the workplace. Drawing on conservation of resources and emotional contagion theories, this study examines the extent to which team-level emotional contagion moderates the impact of stress on wellbeing, factoring in multilevel effects. Data from 237 professional services employees nested within 41 teams was analyzed. The results show support for emotional contagion as a team-level moderator between individual-level work stress and employee wellbeing. The role of organizational resources in shaping stress and wellbeing outcomes was also significant. This study underscores the significance of team dynamics and organizational resources in shaping employee wellbeing. Well-targeted, stress alleviation, and team-contagion enhancing initiatives will have a more positive impact on wellbeing, than individually targeted stress alleviation initiatives in isolation.

Strongly Enhanced Electronic Bandstructure Renormalization by Light in Nanoscale Strained Regions of Monolayer MoS2/Au(111) Heterostructures.

Understanding and controlling the photoexcited quasiparticle (QP) dynamics in monolayer (ML) transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs) lays the foundation for exploring the strongly interacting, nonequilibrium two-dimensional (2D) QP and polaritonic states in these quantum materials and for harnessing the properties emerging from these states for optoelectronic applications. In this study, scanning tunneling microscopy/spectroscopy (STM/scanning tunneling spectroscopy) with light illumination at the tunneling junction is performed to investigate the QP dynamics in ML MoS2 on an Au(111) substrate with nanoscale corrugations. The corrugations on the surface of the substrate induce nanoscale local strain in the overlaying ML MoS2 single crystal, which result in energetically favorable spatial regions where photoexcited QPs, including excitons, trions, and electron-hole plasmas, accumulate. These strained regions exhibit pronounced electronic bandstructure renormalization as a function of the photoexcitation wavelength and intensity as well as the strain gradient, implying strong interplay among nanoscale structures, strain, and photoexcited QPs. In conjunction with the experimental work, we construct a theoretical framework that integrates nonuniform nanoscale strain into the electronic bandstructure of a ML MoS2 lattice using a tight-binding approach combined with first-principle calculations. This methodology enables better understanding of the experimental observation of photoexcited QP localization in the nanoscale strain-modulated electronic bandstructure landscape. Our findings illustrate the feasibility of utilizing nanoscale architectures and optical excitations to manipulate the local electronic bandstructure of ML TMDs and to enhance the many-body interactions of excitons, which is promising for the development of nanoscale energy-adjustable optoelectronic and photonic technologies, including quantum emitters and solid-state quantum simulators for interacting exciton polaritons based on engineered periodic nanoscale trapping potentials.

The Impact of Online Pandemic-Related Information on Prosocial Behavior among Healthcare Students: The Role of Emotional Contagion and Epistemic Motivation.

Prosocial behavior is fundamental for healthcare students, shaped by their traits and the external environment. Online information seeking is the most commonly used way for healthcare students to access pandemics; however, it is unclear whether the willingness of healthcare students to help others will be affected by pandemic information via the Internet environment. The current study takes the COVID-19 pandemic as an example, investigating how 81 healthcare students with varying prosocial tendencies behaved helpfully after being exposed to pandemic-related pictures online. Study 1 measured the influence of emotional contagion (positive emotion/negative emotion) from online information on students' prosocial behavior; Study 2 examined online information's influence on prosocial behavior by controlling individuals' epistemic motivation (goal-directed task/no-goal-directed task) to gain pandemic information. The results indicated that negative pandemic information was more likely to influence students with low prosocial tendencies, which would then lead to a decrease in prosocial actions (F = 7.842, p = 0.005). Further, students with low prosocial tendencies were more likely to engage in prosocial behavior when they did not aim goal-directed attention to the pandemic-related information, compared to those with goal-directed attention (F = 9.159, p = 0.003). Participants with high prosocial tendencies did not differ much in helping others (p > 0.05). The results indicated that only healthcare students with limited prosocial tendencies were less inclined to assist others after receiving negative information about the pandemic. Thus, reducing their deliberate approach to online information related to the pandemic will increase their chances of taking prosocial behavior.

Novel dopant-free ferromagnetic Mott-like insulator and high-energy correlated-plasmons in unconventional strongly correlated s band of low-dimensional gold

Ferromagnetic insulators and plasmons have attracted a lot of interest due to their rich fundamental science and applications. Recent research efforts have been made to find dopant-free ferromagnetic insulators and unconventional plasmons independently both in strongly correlated electron systems. However, our understanding of them is still lacking. Existing dopant-free ferromagnetic insulator materials are mostly limited to complex d- or f-systems with extremely low Curie temperature, low-symmetry structure, and strict growth conditions on specific substrates, limiting their compatibility with industrial applications. Unconventional plasmon is, on the other hand, a quasiparticle that originates from the collective excitation of correlated-charges, yet they are rarely explored, particularly in ferromagnetic insulator materials. Herewith, we present a novel, room temperature dopant-free ferromagnetic Mott-like insulator with a high-symmetry structure in unconventional strongly correlated s band of low-dimensional highly oriented single-crystal gold quantum dots (HOSG-QDs) on MgO(001). Interestingly, HOSG-QDs show new high-energy correlated-plasmons with low-plasmonics-loss. With a series of state-of-the-art experimental techniques, we find that the Mott-insulating state is tunable with surprisingly strong spin-splitting and spin polarization accompanied by strong s–s transitions, disappearance of Drude response, and generating new Mott-like gap. Supported with a series of theoretical calculations, the interplay of quantum confinement, many-body electronic correlations, and hybridizations tunes electron–electron correlations in s band and determines the ferromagnetism, Mott-like insulator, and high-energy correlated-plasmons. Our result shows a new class of room temperature dopant-free ferromagnetic Mott-like insulator and high-energy correlated-plasmons with low-loss in strongly correlated s band and opens unexplored applications of low-dimensional gold in spin field-effect transistors and plasmonics.

The emergence of team compassion: Theoretical implications and practical interventions

With the recent experiences involving COVID-19, there is a growing need for organisations to better understand compassion in addressing employees’ suffering and boosting their well-being. Particularly, as teamwork is becoming ubiquitous, organisational scholars have identified positive benefits of compassion at the team level such as improving communication, decreasing interpersonal conflicts and boosting team effectiveness. Using a multilevel theoretical framework in reviewing compassion research, this article advances our understanding of team-level compassion by elucidating the processes through which individual-level compassion gives rise to team-level compassion. First, we delineate composition and compilation models of the emergence of team compassion and review empirical studies with respect to the two models. Second, we explain three social mechanisms in teams – social learning, emotional contagion and reciprocity – that shape the emergence of team compassion. Finally, we discuss interventions that can facilitate the emergence of team compassion and offer practical guidance for managers seeking to foster team compassion. JEL Classification: D23, I31

Emotion, memory and storytelling: postmemorial emotion work in Vietnamese American graphic narratives

The article demonstrates how graphic narratives become a medium for managing inherited emotions in Vietnamese American second-generation works, GB Tran’s Vietnamerica and Thi Bui’s The Best We Could Do. Highlighting the intergenerational transmission of emotions in Vietnamese American families through parental stories about the Vietnam War, the article argues that the authors’ attempts to represent these family stories transform graphic literature into a medium for postmemorial emotion work. While drawing theoretical insights from the sociology of emotions, the study employs textual analysis to thematically close read Vietnamerica and The Best We Could Do to understand the graphic strategies that aid emotion work. The graphic recreation of stories, which are narrativised versions of their inherited trauma memories, can offer potential trauma resolution and autobiographical clarity while fostering communal bonding. The analysis finds that in the works, emotion work is facilitated by various literary strategies, such as affective genealogies, affective geographies, affective pasts, and postmemorial re-embodiment. In a broader sense, the study concludes that graphic narrative strategies can aid in postmemorial emotion work for second-generation refugees grappling with inherited trauma, incoherent autobiographical knowledge, and detachment from the community or family.

The indirect effect of parents’ work-family conflict on students’ psychosocial well-being

ABSTRACT This study aims to investigate the cascading impact of parents’ work-family conflict (WFC) on students’ psychosocial well-being. This study examines the sequential mediation effect of parents’ well-being and positive discipline using the conservation of resources (COR) theory and emotional contagion theory. Data were collected using an online survey platform where every participant received a concern form and unique code. The analysis used data from 351 parent–child dyads after removing 76 participants who failed the attention check items or did not complete the three phases of data collection. Data were analysed using a sequential mediation regression model six proposed by Hayes. The results confirmed a sequential mediation model where the parent's WFC indirectly impacted the student's psychosocial well-being through the mediating role of the parent's well-being and positive discipline. This study also discovered that WFC directly impacted parents’ well-being, positive discipline, and students’ psychosocial well-being. Organisations must provide parents with psychological services to reduce WFC and maintain their well-being. On the other hand, schools should communicate with parents and encourage positive discipline for students. This current study has advanced the literature by examining the link between parents’ WFC and students’ psychosocial well-being.

The relationship between social odour awareness and emotional contagion susceptibility in females.

Previous research has shown a strong link between our sense of smell and emotion. More recently, the importance we attach to olfaction has been found to relate to our susceptibility to 'catch' the emotions of others. We explore this further by examining the relation between a newly developed measure of olfaction (social odour scale, SOS), which measures awareness of social odours, and emotional contagion susceptibility in female participants. The study therefore aimed to test the strength of this relationship and also help validate the English language version of the SOS. Female (n = 148) participants completed an online study that measured odour awareness [SOS; important of odour questionnaire, IOQ] and emotional contagion (EC). We found that the English version of the SOS yielded high reliability and supported the previous factor structure of the scale; additionally, we demonstrated a strong association between the SOS and IOQ which provides criterion validity for its usage. The study also revealed that whilst both the SOS and IOQ were positively associated with EC, the SOS was the more accurate predictor. These findings provide further validation for the use of the SOS and suggest that our subjective awareness of olfaction, especially concerning 'social odours' is an accurate predictor of emotional contagion.

Vocabulary Herfindahl Index (VocaHIn): Linguistic Dominance and Collective Effervescence in WallStreetBets

Our analysis of 150,000 WallStreetBets comments reveals dominant phrases when members of the community experience collective excitement and solidarity (Collective Effervescence). Using the novel Vocabulary Herfindahl Index (VocaHIn), we find that stock returns volatility increases after CE, and vice versa.

A research of higher-order network emotional phase transitions

This paper explores the law of emotion transmission on the social Internet. By applying higher-order network theory, ER random networks are reconstructed and higher-order network structures with multiple interaction points are generated. The I-state of the SI model is extended to set up the propagation rules of emotions based on higher-order networks. Concepts such as sentiment recession rate are introduced to make sentiment propagate through different simplexes, so as to obtain the propagation rules of higher-order networks. Qualitative analysis of emotional changes during the propagation process verifies the phase transition phenomenon of emotions in the network. By comparing simulated results with actual data, we demonstrate the accuracy of our higher-order network-based emotion propagation model in reflecting real-world trends and outcomes. The study also explores the effects of factors such as the initial proportion of extreme emotions on emotion propagation. This study provides valuable insights into understanding the operation of complex systems and offers important implications for government predictions of opinion development.

Surface excitation of Rydberg dressed quantum droplet of Bose–Einstein Condensates

We have considered a quantum droplet of two components of Bose–Einstein condensate (BEC) inside the electron of a Rydberg atom to study the surface mode of collective excitation using the Bogoliubov theory of excitation. We have calculated the surface excitation spectrum for various Rydberg electron-atom interaction strengths. From the energy spectrum, we calculated the surface tension of the droplet as a function of Rydberg electron-atom interaction strength. Our study shows that the electron-atom interaction enhances the surface energy; hence, the droplet will be more stable inside the electron of a Rydberg atom.

Nuancing 'Emotional' Social Play: Does Play Behaviour Always Underlie a Positive Emotional State?

This review focuses on social play, a complex behaviour that is often difficult to categorize. Although play has been typically associated with positive emotional states, a thorough examination of the literature indicates that it may relate to different emotional systems, from attachment to conflict. Play oscillates between competition and cooperation, and includes a spectrum in between; thus, quantitatively identifying and demonstrating the emotional nature of play remains challenging. We considered examples from human and non-human animal studies and explored the emotional and neuro-hormonal systems involved in play. We assessed ethological data possibly indicating the emotional states underlying play, and we focused on the cooperative and competitive elements of play. We investigated the relationship between play and affiliative/aggressive behaviours, the communicative meaning of play signals (especially primate play faces), and the motor and possibly emotional contagion function of rapid motor mimicry during play. From all the literature on play, this review selects and combines studies in an innovative way to present the methods (e.g., play indices and social network analysis), tools (e.g., sequential analysis and facial coding software), and evidence indicative of the emotional states underlying play, which is much more complex than previously thought.

Dose increment in ultrashort particle irradiations via coherent stopping power

We present a relativistic self-consistent theory of the coherent stopping power (CSP) of ultradense charged particle beams propagating in a dense matter. CSP corresponds to a collective inelastic collision which adds to the ordinary stopping power of individual particles. Unlike the latter, which depends only on the particles' energy, CSP depends upon many more parameters such as the total charge of the ensemble and its charge density and shape. This paves the way for a broad variety of novel methods to tailor particle absorption and penetration in a dense matter. CSP losses can be explained both by collective excitations of single or multiple molecules and by the emission of coherent Cherenkov radiation. Here we demonstrate that the former mechanism is more relevant than the latter. We find that the coherent energy absorption of subpicosecond particle bunches in water occurs exciting a broad Debye process in the GHz range and an intermolecular stretching vibration mode in the THz region. We generalize the Bethe-Bloch stopping power formula to coherent effects including self-forces, dielectric screening, and absorption by the dense matter. For the sake of a self-consistent dynamical theory including phase space evolution, we have also generalized the Fermi-Eyges theory of particle diffusion to the presence of forces. Nonlinear dynamics is demonstrated, inducing nonlinear dose release, beam self-focusing, and self-enhancement of coherent losses. Given the advent of ultraintense particle sources and their use for biomedical and other relevant applications, our results may be of paramount importance for contemporary and future developments of science and technology. Published by the American Physical Society 2024

Active fluctuations in the harmonic chain: phonons, entropons and velocity correlations

Non-equilibrium random fluctuations of a non-thermal nature are a defining feature of active matter. In this work, we study the collective excitations of active systems at high density, focusing on a one-dimensional chain of elastically coupled inertial particles, where activity is modeled by an Ornstein–Uhlenbeck process. The excitation spectrum reveals two types of fluctuations: thermally excited phonons, analogous to those in passive crystals, and entropons, which are associated with entropy production due to active forces. These fluctuations exhibit distinct properties: only entropons generate spatial velocity correlations and violate the standard fluctuation-response relation. We derive exact expressions for equal-time velocity and displacement correlations, as well as for the structure factor, identifying the contributions from both phonons and entropons. Finally, we explore the dynamical properties of these excitations through steady-state two-time correlations, such as the intermediate scattering function and mean-square displacement. Both phonon and entropon fluctuations are characterized by a long-wavelength overdamped regime and a short-wavelength underdamped regime. In the large persistence case, entropons decay more slowly than phonons, and activity generally suppresses the oscillations typical of the underdamped regime.

How emotional contagion shapes spiritual care competence: Insights from a cross-sectional study on intensive care nurses.

Intensive care units (ICUs) are environments where nurses are open to emotional interactions because of complex structures and dynamic relationships. Nurses' susceptibility to emotional contagion and their spiritual care competence may affect the quality of care by influencing their ability to manage and respond to the emotional dynamics present in these environments. This study aimed to determine the level of emotional contagion and spiritual care competence in intensive care nurses. This study is a descriptive cross-sectional study conducted with 199 nurses working in the ICUs of a training and research hospital in Turkey. The data were collected between December 2021 and June 2022 using the Emotional Contagion Scale (ECS) and the Spiritual Care Competence Scale (SCCS). The mean score of the nurses was 50.29 ± 15.36 on the ECS and 90.29 ± 29.53 on the SCCS. A statistically significant difference was found between the ECS and SCCS and gender, marital status, weekly working hours and some approaches about spiritual care (p < .05). It was determined that there was a statistically significant positive correlation between the total scales and sub-dimensions of the ECS and SCCS (p < .05). In this study, it was found that intensive care nurses' susceptibility to emotional contagion was high, and that their spiritual care competence was at a moderate level. The results show that gender, marital status, weekly working hours, type of ICU and some approaches about spiritual care are crucial factors in nurses' emotional contagion and spiritual care competence. In addition, as the intensive care nurses' susceptibility to emotional contagion increased, their spiritual care competence also increased. The results of this study will guide the planning of interventions to protect intensive care nurses from the negative effects of emotional contagion and increase their spiritual care competence. It is necessary to protect intensive care nurses from the negative effects of emotional contagion and to increase their competences in spiritual care.

Social Avoidance of Mice in Pain in Naturalistic Conditions

AbstractPain and social behavior are subject to reciprocal modulation. Social animals show attenuated pain behavior in the presence of conspecifics, while observers are in turn affected by exposure to another individual in pain. Both phenomena have been established in rodents, which in addition to experiencing emotional contagion from afflicted conspecifics may act to relieve their afflicted state. Little has been done to investigate the motivation of such prosocial behavior in naturalistic conditions. Here, using a novel formalin test targeting the nape of the neck, a socially relevant area, we investigated nocifensive behaviors and social interactions in mice group-housed in a seminatural environment (SNE). In the SNE, formalin-injected mice displayed fewer back-scratching occurrences than when housed alone, which was inversely correlated to the social behavior received. These mice also emitted and received fewer social interactions, attesting of social withdrawal. With respect to dyadic exchanges, saline-treated mice initiated fewer allosniffing and anogenital sniffing episodes towards formalin-treated mice than towards other saline-treated ones. These findings are counter to those showing empathy and prosocial approach in mouse pain models. It is possible that in naturalistic conditions that allow the mice to express a wide range of their behavioral repertoire, healthy mice simply avoid individuals in pain and the cost associated with emotional contagion. Interestingly, behaviors involving direct body contact, namely allogrooming and pair-resting, were not different between saline- and formalin-treated mice and thus may carry a prosocial, altruistic component. These findings unveil new patterns of social modulation by pain in a naturalistic laboratory setting holding high translational value.

The impact of the environment factors on co-evolution process of information-emotions-epidemic dynamics in activity-driven multiplex networks

Abstract During public health emergencies, the diffusion of negative information can exacerbate the transmission of adverse emotions, such as fear and anxiety. These emotions can adversely affect immune function and consequently influence epidemic spreading. In this paper, we establish a coupled model incorporating environmental factors to explore the co-evolution dynamic process of information-emotions-epidemic dynamics in activity-driven multiplex networks. In this model, environmental factors refer to external conditions or pressures that affect the spread of information, emotions, and epidemics. These factors include media coverage, public opinion, and the prevalence of disease in the neighborhood. These layers are dynamically cross-coupled, where the environmental factors in the information layer are influenced by the emotional layer, and the higher levels of anxious states among neighboring individuals, the greater the likelihood of information diffusion. While environmental factors in the emotional layer are influenced by both the information layer and the epidemic layer, it comes from the factors of global information and the proportion of local infections among surrounding neighbors. Subsequently, we utilize the Microscopic Markov Chain Approach (MMCA) to describe the dynamical processes, thereby obtaining the epidemic threshold. Finally, we draw conclusions through numerical modeling and analysis. The conclusions suggest that when negative information heightens the probability of anxious states transmission across the population. The transmission of anxious states increases the final size of the disease and decreases the outbreak threshold. Reducing the impact of environmental factors at both the informational and emotional levels is beneficial in controlling the scale of the spread of the epidemic. Our findings can provide a reference for improving the public’s health awareness and behavioral decision-making, mitigating the adverse impacts of anxious states, and ultimately controlling the spreading of epidemics.

Principles of two-dimensional terahertz spectroscopy of collective excitations: The case of Josephson plasmons in layered superconductors

Principles of two-dimensional terahertz spectroscopy of collective excitations: The case of Josephson plasmons in layered superconductors

Heterogeneous emotional contagion of the cyber–physical society

When emergencies occur, panic spreads quickly across cyberspace and physical space. Despite widespread attention to emotional contagion in cyber–physical societies (CPS), existing studies often overlook individual relationship heterogeneity, which results in imprecise models. To address this issue, we propose a heterogeneous emotional contagion method for CPS. First, we introduce the Strong–Weak Emotional Contagion Model (SW-ECM) to simulate the heterogeneous emotional contagion process in CPS. Second, we formulate the mean-field equations for the SW-ECM to accurately capture the dynamic evolution of heterogeneous emotional contagion in the CPS. Finally, we construct a small-world network based on strong–weak relationships to validate the effectiveness of our method. The experimental results show that our method can effectively simulate the heterogeneous emotional contagion and capture changes in relationships between individuals, providing valuable guidance for crowd evacuations prone to emotional contagion.