Who Are the 2022 Ig Nobel Prize Winners and What Are Their Research Topics?

[anorlunda]

• Medicine Prize ... discovered that people taking the cancer drug melphalan reported that a common side effect of the treatment—irritation in the mouth known as oral mucositis—could be prevented if the patients slowly ate ice cream or popsicles during their melphalan infusions.
• Applied Cardiology “for seeking and finding evidence that when new romantic partners meet for the first time, and feel attracted to each other, their heart rates synchronize”
• Biology Prize for their study of how constipation affects the scorpions’ ability to mate
• Physics Prize for “trying to understand how ducklings manage to swim in formation.”
• Safety Engineering Prize. ... The thesis, naturally titled Moose Crash Test Dummy, has made quite an impact
• Literature Prize “for analyzing what makes legal documents unnecessarily difficult to understand”
• Peace Prize. “for developing an algorithm to help gossipers decide when to tell the truth and when to lie”
• Art History Prize for “A Multidisciplinary Approach to Ritual Enema Scenes on Ancient Maya Pottery”

https://improbable.com/ig/winners/

 

[berkeman]

I'm going to have to read that paper -- it seems pretty strange to me...

APPLIED CARDIOLOGY PRIZE [CZECH REPUBLIC, THE NETHERLANDS, UK, SWEDEN, ARUBA]

Eliska Prochazkova, Elio Sjak-Shie, Friederike Behrens, Daniel Lindh, and Mariska Kret, for seeking and finding evidence that when new romantic partners meet for the first time, and feel attracted to each other, their heart rates synchronize.

REFERENCE: “Physiological Synchrony is Associated with Attraction in a Blind Date Setting,” Eliska Prochazkova, Elio Sjak-Shie, Friederike Behrens, Daniel Lindh, and Mariska E. Kret, Nature Human Behaviour, vol. 6, no. 2, 2022, pp. 269-278.
<https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-021-01197-3>

WHO TOOK PART IN THE CEREMONY: Eliska Prochazkova, Mariska Kret

 

[pinball1970]

I'm going to have to read that paper -- it seems pretty strange to me...

Pretty Strange!? How would that even work?
Ok I have not read it but just reading the title sounds like Deepak woo woo.

 

[berkeman]

How would that even work?

My question exactly. Maybe if I took her pulse at the same time I was taking mine, and sped up or slowed my heart rate to try to synchronize them I could come close, but how could you possibly phase lock them? I guess one of us is going to have to read the article. Rho-sham-bo!

 

[pinball1970]

My question exactly. Maybe if I took her pulse at the same time I was taking mine, and sped up or slowed my heart rate to try to synchronize them I could come close, but how could you possibly phase lock them? I guess one of us is going to have to read the article. Rho-sham-bo!

Yes two issues.
Say I am relaxed but my partner is anxious? In tears? Has been waiting for me to finish work so I can get there and calm her down? I am ok, I feel better that I am there for her and she has gone from hysterical outpouring to sobbing to just crying. A bit stressful but you know once she gets it out of her system she will be good. Your heart rate will increase a little bit, increased volume of her voice, higher frequencies, I get that but will your heart rate match hers? Why? Our shared experiences do not equate to an identical physiological level like heart rate. Two guys doing the same run will have different heart rate and BP all the way through.
Second issue, just say my body does match my partner exactly. Due to love, aura or woo woo.
How does one system coordinate with the other? Reset?

 

[JT Smith]

There is nothing in the paper about heart rate phase synchronization. I think this is a case of the headline being juiced a bit to sell the product.

The Ig Nobels are a lot of fun.

 

[Hornbein]

Hey, if the IgNobels can't misrepresent research, who can?

 

[pinball1970]

Hey, if the IgNobels can't misrepresent research, who can?

When I read the title my brain skipped the "Ig," then I started to read the some of the candidates.
Something did not seem right!