Be
introverted or extroverted? To answer this question, most people consider whether they have fun at parties, have trouble engaging in conversations with strangers, or can speak in public without stress, but the problem with this approach is that it's not very objective. . We should answer honestly, and it is difficult not to fall into self-deception and reconfirm the ideal image we have of ourselves.A completely different approach to answering this question involves the use of a lemon, or rather, lemon juice. concentrated. In fact, it is a test that has a long history in the context of personality psychology, and it is very easy to do at home.You just need a cotton swab, to which you will have to tie a thread exactly in the center . You need to put one end of the cotton swab on your tongue for 20 seconds. Now remove the stick and put five drops of concentrated lemon juice on your tongue, swallow and put the other end of the cotton stick on your tongue for another 20 seconds. Finally, take the cotton swab by the thread and leave it hanging, at this point you will have to see if it stays more or less horizontal or if the end you used after ingesting the lemon juice hangs lower in the which case is heavier. If this tip hangs down it is because the lemon juice has made you salivate more than usual, a physiological sign that you are an introverted person. Conversely, if the cotton swab stays relatively horizontal, it means that you haven't reacted very strongly to lemon juice and you are probably an outgoing person. Because? How can this phenomenon be explained?
In fact, this simple experiment dates back to the mid-1960s, and was carried out by pioneers in personality psychology, Hans Eysenck and Sybil Eysenck. In the original experiment these psychologists used instruments to measure the amount of saliva absorbed by cotton before and after. that people were exposed to lemon juice. These researchers wanted to confirm the "cortical arousal theory" about extroversion and introversion. According to psychologists, these personality characteristics have a physiological basis, so that introverted people have greater basal cortical arousal, which makes so that they react more intensely to stimuli. In practice, introverts have greater cortical activation, which would explain why they tend to be more persistent and prefer to avoid social activities that cause arousal. and activities that generate excitement. Thus, the Eysencks discovered that introverts tend to salivate more in response to lemon juice and that extroverts climb less.However, today we know that although introversion and extroversion have a biological and genetic component, the theory of arousal is only a half truth. There is ample evidence indicating that introverts tend to respond more forcefully to loud noises and other sensory stimuli. But contrary to Eysenck's theory, there is little evidence that introverts have a higher level of basal arousal, so even though the lemon test cannot accurately predict whether you are extroverted or introverted, it will give some clues as to your physical sensitivity. If you wish to do this you should repeat it at least a couple of times to get more reliable results.
However, the lemon test can also give other clues about your personality. Research conducted recently at the University of Zurich used lemon to determine the level of empathy. These psychologists asked the participants to put three pieces of cotton in their mouths to collect saliva. Meanwhile, they had to watch two videos of one minute each, the first showing a man moving colored balls, the second showing a man cutting and eating a lemon.After analyzing the cotton, the psychologists found that the participants salivated. more seeing the man who ate the lemon, a reaction known as "autonomous resonance", that is, we have a tendency to automatically imitate the physiological states of others, such as when we yawn when we see someone yawn. In fact, with magnetic resonance it has been seen that when we see a person suffering in our brain, the same areas related to pain are activated, due, among other things, to the activation of mirror neurons.However, people differed in the degree of sensitivity , which was found in the amount of saliva. Psychologists found that the most empathic people were the ones who salivated the most. Of course, taking this test at home is more complicated because you would need to have other people's tests available to compare the results. Still, they are interesting experiments that help us understand that the body and the mind are an indissoluble unity.
