@article{delangle_speaking_2026,

title = {Speaking face-to-face with a virtual avatar to reduce anxiety in students who stutter: Tool development and pilot study results},

author = {M. Delangle and A. Moïse-Richard and A. -L. Leclercq and D. Labbé and S. Bouchard and S. Andrews and L. Ménard},

url = {https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-105028302364&doi=10.1016%2Fj.jfludis.2026.106194&partnerID=40&md5=af0d246f9187ee19796f36456887400b},

doi = {10.1016/j.jfludis.2026.106194},

issn = {0094730X (ISSN)},

year  = {2026},

date = {2026-01-01},

journal = {Journal of Fluency Disorders},

volume = {87},

abstract = {Purpose Speaking in class is challenging for students who stutter. Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) with exposure in virtual reality (VR) emerges as a promising intervention for treating speaking anxiety in pediatric populations. This pilot study tested if real-time avatar-based VR can elicit anxiety responses while remaining acceptable to youth who stutter. Method Twelve students who stutter (aged 9–18) were randomly assigned to a single training session conducted either (1) in VR with a realistic avatar controlled live by their SLP, or (2) in role-play with their SLP, before facing a real actor. We assessed system acceptability, anxiety levels and perceived self-efficacy. Results The VR system was well accepted and elicited physiological arousal comparable to real-life interactions. Although participants reported experiencing less anxiety during VR, skin conductance level showed higher arousal; suggesting a divergence between the subjective report and physiological response. Finally, one training session (either in VR or with the SLP) did not produce gains in self-efficacy or decrease in anxiety related to the final real-actor conversation. Conclusion This study demonstrates evidence that the potential use of immersive VR could represent an acceptable and viable complementary strategy for SLP treatment, that could control exposure parameters while evoking physiological responses similar to real-life contexts. The differences between subjective and physiological measures suggest that VR is inducing anxiety responses differently than it was perceived. Further research could investigate the use of VR as anxiety interventions for students who stutter and should be explored across multi-session studies to understand their therapeutic effect. © 2026 The Authors.},

keywords = {Adolescent, adult, Anxiety, Arousal, article, Avatar, avoidance behavior, Canada, Child, clinical article, cognitive behavioral therapy, complication, controlled study, distance learning, ecological validity, electrocardiogram, electrodermal response, exposure, female, Heart Rate, heart rate variability, human, Humans, Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale, Likert scale, male, nonverbal communication, physiological stress, Pilot Projects, pilot study, procedures, psychology, questionnaire, randomized controlled trial, role playing, School-age children, Self Concept, Self Efficacy, self report, Signal processing, skin conductance, social anxiety, speech, student, Students, Stuttering, Therapy, treatment outcome, virtual reality, virtual reality exposure therapy},

pubstate = {published},

tppubtype = {article}

}

@article{gingras_cultural_2026,

title = {Cultural differences in spatial frequency tunings to faces do not generalize to visual scenes and object stimuli},

author = {F. Gingras and D. Fiset and M. -P. Plouffe-Demers and A. Estéphan and M. N’Guiamba and D. Sun and Y. Zhang and C. Blais},

url = {https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-105025378146&doi=10.3758%2Fs13423-025-02832-0&partnerID=40&md5=43840b8cfa4c2df54e647f03a452f8e5},

doi = {10.3758/s13423-025-02832-0},

issn = {10699384 (ISSN)},

year  = {2026},

date = {2026-01-01},

journal = {Psychonomic Bulletin and Review},

volume = {33},

number = {1},

abstract = {Previous research has identified cultural differences in visual perception, where East Asians focus more on global object structure and display a larger breadth of attention compared with Westerners. East Asians rely on lower spatial frequencies (SFs) compared to Westerners for face recognition, which may be linked to this. Investigating whether such differences extend to other high-level stimulus categories would clarify if SF tuning differences reflect more general or face specific cognitive processes. The present study compared the SF tunings of Canadians and Chinese during object (Exp. 1; N = 50) and scene (Exp. 3; N = 47) categorization. In both experiments, results did not indicate a significant difference between groups. In Experiment 3 (N = 128), we conducted an online replication of Experiment 1 while measuring the SF tunings of the same participants during face perception. Again, no significant difference between the groups was found during object categorization, but the finding that East Asians rely on lower SF than Westerners was replicated. Together, these results suggest that unique mechanisms may underlie the cultural differences in face processing, though alternative explanations, such as the feature consistency of faces, could also account for these findings. © The Psychonomic Society, Inc. 2025.},

keywords = {Adolescent, adult, Asian, Asian People, Canada, Caucasian, China, Cross-Cultural Comparison, Cross-cultural psychology, cultural factor, Depth Perception, Face processing, Facial Recognition, female, human, Humans, male, Object processing, Pattern Recognition, physiology, Scene processing, Space Perception, Spatial frequencies, Visual, visual pattern recognition, Visual Perception, White People, Young Adult},

pubstate = {published},

tppubtype = {article}

}

@article{corno_development_2024,

title = {Development of a visual-perceptual method to assess body image: A cross-cultural validation in Canadian and Spanish women},

author = {G. Corno and A. Paquette and D. Burychka and M. Miragall and M. -C. Rivard and R. M. Baños and S. Bouchard},

url = {https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85189089793&doi=10.1002%2ferv.3086&partnerID=40&md5=99c221e60e3d5caad167cec6fd25dddd},

doi = {10.1002/erv.3086},

issn = {10724133 (ISSN)},

year  = {2024},

date = {2024-01-01},

journal = {European Eating Disorders Review},

publisher = {John Wiley and Sons Ltd},

abstract = {The objectives of this study were (a) to explore the preliminary cross-cultural validity of a visual-perceptual method to assess body image; (b) to examine potential differences and similarities in body image phenomena between women from two Western countries (i.e., Canada and Spain). 201 self-identified women participated in this cross-sectional study. Ideal, normal, and self-perceived body sizes were assessed using a visual-perceptual method, whereas body dissatisfaction was measured using both a visual-perceptual method and a questionnaire. Visual-perceptual body dissatisfaction was significantly correlated with questionnaire body dissatisfaction, suggesting a preliminary convergent validity between the two assessment methods. Women in both countries were dissatisfied with their bodies. Compared to their self-perceived body, all women chose a significantly thinner visual representation of their “normal” and ideal body. These results may suggest a shift towards the “thin” body as not only ideal, but also normative. This study provides the first evidence for the cross-cultural validity of a visual-perceptual body image assessment tool. The results of the current study confirm the presence of “normative discontent”, and suggest more cross-country similarities than differences among women from these two Western societies. © 2024 Eating Disorders Association and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.},

note = {Publisher: John Wiley and Sons Ltd},

keywords = {Adolescent, adult, analytic method, article, assessment, body dissatisfaction, body image, body image dissatisfaction, Body Size, Canada, Canadian, controlled study, convergent validity, correlation analysis, cross validation, cross-country, Cross-Cultural Comparison, Cross-Sectional Studies, cross-sectional study, cultural anthropology, cultural factor, exploratory research, female, human, Humans, ideal body size, intermethod comparison, Middle Aged, normal body size, psychology, questionnaire, reproducibility, Reproducibility of Results, Self Concept, Spain, Spaniard, Surveys and Questionnaires, thin ideal, underweight, vision, Visual Perception, visual-perceptual method, Young Adult},

pubstate = {published},

tppubtype = {article}

}

@article{quintana_engaging_2023,

title = {Engaging in Awkward Social Interactions in a Virtual Environment Designed for Exposure-Based Psychotherapy for People with Generalized Social Anxiety Disorder: An International Multisite Study},

author = {P. Quintana and S. Bouchard and C. Botella and G. Robillard and B. Serrano and A. Rodriguez-Ortega and M. Torp Ernst and B. Rey and M. Berthiaume and G. Corno},

url = {https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85165033932&doi=10.3390%2fjcm12134525&partnerID=40&md5=7b0f59b46ff7680611d5a64e18909651},

doi = {10.3390/jcm12134525},

issn = {20770383 (ISSN)},

year  = {2023},

date = {2023-01-01},

journal = {Journal of Clinical Medicine},

volume = {12},

number = {13},

publisher = {Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (MDPI)},

abstract = {The effectiveness of in virtuo exposure-based treatment of performance-only social anxiety disorder (SAD) has been demonstrated in several studies. However, few studies have validated virtual environments with participants suffering from generalized SAD. The goal of this study is to confirm the potential of a virtual environment in inducing anxiety in adults suffering from generalized SAD, compared to adults without SAD, when engaged in awkward social interactions. Differences between participants from two different countries were also explored. The sample consisted of 15 participants with SAD from Canada, 17 participants without SAD from Canada, 16 participants with SAD from Spain, and 21 participants without SAD from Spain. All participants were immersed in a control virtual environment and in an experimental virtual environment considered potentially anxiety-inducing for individuals with generalized SAD. As hypothesized, results showed that the experimental virtual environment induced a higher level of anxiety than the control environment among participants with SAD compared to those without SAD. The impact on anxiety of each socially threatening task performed during the experimental immersion was statistically significant. In terms of anxiety responses, no significant differences were found between participants from Canada and Spain. However, spatial presence and ecological validity were higher in Canadians than in Spaniards. Unwanted negative side effects induced by immersions in virtual reality were higher in the SAD group. This study highlights the importance for therapists to engage people with SAD in clinically relevant tasks while immersed in VR psychotherapeutic applications. © 2023 by the authors.},

note = {Publisher: Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (MDPI)},

keywords = {adult, anxiety assessment, article, Canada, clinical article, controlled study, cultural differences, ecological validity, exposure, female, generalized social anxiety, human, immersion, male, multicenter study, psychotherapy, self report, social anxiety, social interaction, social phobia, Spain, virtual reality, virtual reality exposure therapy},

pubstate = {published},

tppubtype = {article}

}

@article{gingras_differences_2023,

title = {Differences in eye movements for face recognition between Canadian and Chinese participants are not modulated by social orientation},

author = {F. Gingras and A. Estéphan and D. Fiset and H. Lingnan and R. Caldara and C. Blais},

url = {https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85179766751&doi=10.1371%2fjournal.pone.0295256&partnerID=40&md5=34499ca3a094ccf3937f07a1fb177c82},

doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0295256},

issn = {19326203 (ISSN)},

year  = {2023},

date = {2023-01-01},

journal = {PLoS ONE},

volume = {18},

number = {12 December},

publisher = {Public Library of Science},

abstract = {Face recognition strategies do not generalize across individuals. Many studies have reported robust cultural differences between West Europeans/North Americans and East Asians in eye movement strategies during face recognition. The social orientation hypothesis posits that individualistic vs. collectivistic (IND/COL) value systems, respectively defining West European/North American and East Asian societies, would be at the root of many cultural differences in visual perception. Whether social orientation is also responsible for such cultural contrast in face recognition remains to be clarified. To this aim, we conducted two experiments with West European/North American and Chinese observers. In Experiment 1, we probed the existence of a link between IND/COL social values and eye movements during face recognition, by using an IND/COL priming paradigm. In Experiment 2, we dissected the latter relationship in greater depth, by using two IND/COL questionnaires, including subdimensions to those concepts. In both studies, cultural differences in fixation patterns were revealed between West European/North American and East Asian observers. Priming IND/ COL values did not modulate eye movement visual sampling strategies, and only specific subdimensions of the IND/COL questionnaires were associated with distinct eye-movement patterns. Altogether, we show that the typical contrast between IND/COL cannot fully account for cultural differences in eye movement strategies for face recognition. Cultural differences in eye movements for faces might originate from mechanisms distinct from social orientation. © 2023 Gingras et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.},

note = {Publisher: Public Library of Science},

keywords = {adult, article, Asian, Asian People, Canada, Canadian, China, Chinese, clinical article, Diagnosis, East Asian, eye movement, Eye movements, Facial Recognition, female, human, human experiment, Humans, male, North American, Orientation, questionnaire, social value, vision},

pubstate = {published},

tppubtype = {article}

}

@article{corno_role_2023,

title = {The role of perceived social support on pregnant women’s mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic},

author = {G. Corno and D. Villani and F. Montigny and T. Pierce and S. Bouchard and S. Molgora},

url = {https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85128462603&doi=10.1080%2f02646838.2022.2042799&partnerID=40&md5=aa1b1a6cbd1fab3d6302a31612c86068},

doi = {10.1080/02646838.2022.2042799},

issn = {02646838},

year  = {2023},

date = {2023-01-01},

journal = {Journal of Reproductive and Infant Psychology},

volume = {41},

number = {5},

pages = {488–502},

publisher = {Routledge},

abstract = {Purpose: The present study aimed at investigating which sources of social support best account for pregnant women’s levels of psychological distress and mental well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods: 274 Italian and Canadian expectant mothers completed an online-based survey including measures of perceived social support (from family, significant other and friends), state anxiety, depressive symptoms, and satisfaction with life. Correlation analyses and amultivariate analysis of covariance were performed to explore how social support from different sources was related to depressive symptoms, state anxiety and satisfaction with life. Results: Different sources of social support contributed to explaining women’s psychological distress and mental well-being. Social support both from family and friends was significantly related to women’s state anxiety and depressive symptoms. Social support from friends was specifically related to women’s satisfaction with life. Conclusion: Our findings endorse the crucial role of perceived social support as a protective factor for pregnant women’s mental health. In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, our results suggest that support from family seems important in preventing psychological distress, whereas support from friends is also associated with mental well-being. These results may help designing future interventions aimed at improving women’s perinatal mental health in life-threatening conditions. ©, Society for Reproductive and Infant Psychology.},

note = {Publisher: Routledge},

keywords = {adult, Anxiety, article, Canada, coronavirus disease 2019, COVID-19, cross-sectional study, Depression, Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale, educational status, female, human, Humans, major clinical study, Mental health, mental stress, Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support, pandemic, Pandemics, postnatal depression, Pregnancy, pregnant woman, Pregnant Women, psychology, questionnaire, Satisfaction with Life Scale, Social Support, State Trait Anxiety Inventory},

pubstate = {published},

tppubtype = {article}

}

@article{maiano_validation_2023,

title = {Validation of an Adapted Version of the Glasgow Anxiety Scale for People with Intellectual Disabilities (GAS-ID)},

author = {C. Maïano and A. J. S. Morin and C. Gagnon and E. Olivier and D. Tracey and R. G. Craven and S. Bouchard},

url = {https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85125069450&doi=10.1007%2fs10803-021-05398-7&partnerID=40&md5=7347eb15e719941ce5eca046eb7f4564},

doi = {10.1007/s10803-021-05398-7},

issn = {01623257},

year  = {2023},

date = {2023-01-01},

journal = {Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders},

volume = {53},

number = {4},

pages = {1560–1572},

publisher = {Springer},

abstract = {The objective of the study was to validate adapted versions of the Glasgow Anxiety Scale for people with Intellectual Disabilities (GAS-ID) simultaneously developed in English and French. A sample of 361 youth with mild to moderate intellectual disability (ID) (M = 15.78 years) from Australia (English-speaking) and Canada (French-speaking) participated in this study. The results supported the factor validity and reliability, measurement invariance (between English and French versions), a lack of differential items functioning (as a function of youth’s age and ID level, but not sex in the English-Australian sample), temporal stability (over one year interval), and convergent validity (with global self-esteem and school loneliness) of a bi-factor exploratory structural equation modeling representation of the GAS-ID. The present study supports the psychometric properties of the English-Australian and French-Canadian versions of the adapted GAS-ID. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.},

note = {Publisher: Springer},

keywords = {Adolescent, adult, Anxiety, anxiety assessment, article, Australia, autism, Autism Spectrum Disorder, Canada, Child, confirmatory factor analysis, controlled study, convergent validity, emotion assessment, English (language), exploratory structural equation modeling, female, French (language), glasgow anxiety scale, human, Humans, instrument validation, Intellectual Disability, intellectual impairment, intelligence quotient, loneliness, major clinical study, male, Psychometrics, psychometry, reliability, reproducibility, Reproducibility of Results, school child, school loneliness scale, self description questionnaire 1, self esteem, self report, self-concept assessment, statistical analysis, validity, Young Adult},

pubstate = {published},

tppubtype = {article}

}

@article{guerette_absence_2021,

title = {The absence of fans removes the home advantage associated with penalties called by National Hockey League referees},

author = {J. Guérette and C. Blais and D. Fiset},

url = {https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85113632083&doi=10.1371%2fjournal.pone.0256568&partnerID=40&md5=c868dbaf19331d9d7b7aafbaf23139b4},

doi = {10.1371/journal.pone.0256568},

issn = {19326203},

year  = {2021},

date = {2021-01-01},

journal = {PLoS ONE},

volume = {16},

number = {8 August},

publisher = {Public Library of Science},

abstract = {The COVID-19 pandemic has had a major impact on professional sports, notably, forcing the National Hockey League to hold its 2020 playoffs in empty arenas. This provided an unprecedented opportunity to study how crowds may influence penalties awarded by referees in an ecological context. Using data from playoff games played during the COVID-19 pandemic and the previous 5 years (n = 547), we estimate the number of penalties called by referees depending on whether or not spectators were present. The results show an interaction between a team's status (home; away) and the presence or absence of crowds. Posthoc analyses reveal that referees awarded significantly more penalties to the away team compared to the home team when there is a crowd present. However, when there are no spectators, the number of penalties awarded to the away and home teams are not significantly different. In order to generalize these results, we took advantage of the extension of the pandemic and the unusual game setting it provided to observe the behavior of referees during the 2020-2021 regular season. Again, using data from the National Hockey League (n = 1639), but also expanding our sample to include Canadian Hockey League games (n = 1709), we also find that the advantage given to the home team by referees when in front of a crowd fades in the absence of spectators. These findings provide new evidence suggesting that social pressure does have an impact on referees' decision-making, thus contributing to explain the phenomenon of home advantage in professional ice hockey. © 2021 Guérette et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.},

note = {Publisher: Public Library of Science},

keywords = {article, behavior, Canada, Competitive Behavior, controlled study, coronavirus disease 2019, COVID-19, decision making, Hockey, home, human, Humans, ice hockey, pandemic, psychology, punishment, season, seasonal variation, stimulus, United States},

pubstate = {published},

tppubtype = {article}

}

@article{estephan_time_2018,

title = {Time course of cultural differences in spatial frequency use for face identification},

author = {A. Estéphan and D. Fiset and C. Saumure and M. -P. Plouffe-Demers and Y. Zhang and D. Sun and C. Blais},

url = {https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85041296131&doi=10.1038%2fs41598-018-19971-1&partnerID=40&md5=b9e70f2d9ac7c641171bd6e450316846},

doi = {10.1038/s41598-018-19971-1},

issn = {20452322},

year  = {2018},

date = {2018-01-01},

journal = {Scientific Reports},

volume = {8},

number = {1},

publisher = {Nature Publishing Group},

abstract = {Several previous studies of eye movements have put forward that, during face recognition, Easterners spread their attention across a greater part of their visual field than Westerners. Recently, we found that culture's effect on the perception of faces reaches mechanisms deeper than eye movements, therefore affecting the very nature of information sampled by the visual system: That is, Westerners globally rely more than Easterners on fine-grained visual information (i.e. high spatial frequencies; SFs), whereas Easterners rely more on coarse-grained visual information (i.e. low SFs). These findings suggest that culture influences basic visual processes; however, the temporal onset and dynamics of these culturespecific perceptual differences are still unknown. Here, we investigate the time course of SF use in Western Caucasian (Canadian) and East Asian (Chinese) observers during a face identification task. Firstly, our results confirm that Easterners use relatively lower SFs than Westerners, while the latter use relatively higher SFs. More importantly, our results indicate that these differences arise as early as 34 ms after stimulus onset, and remain stable through time. Our research supports the hypothesis that Westerners and Easterners initially rely on different types of visual information during face processing. © The Author(s) 2018.},

note = {Publisher: Nature Publishing Group},

keywords = {adult, article, Asian Continental Ancestry Group, attention, Canada, Caucasian, European Continental Ancestry Group, eye movement, Eye movements, Facial Recognition, female, financial management, human, human experiment, Humans, male, Pattern Recognition, physiology, stimulus, Visual, visual information, Young Adult},

pubstate = {published},

tppubtype = {article}

}