There are multiple studies where they make people rate their subjective feelings on animals via metrics such as fear, disgust, beauty, or cuteness. These are often used to see which species people instinctively fear, or which people want to conserve. Arthropods are often ranked as evoking fear or disgusting. But these usually involve whole body photographs or sometimes live specimens. But what if we zeroed in on the face?
Most arthropods are viewed or photographed from above, giving a dorsal view of their body.
I would say this sort of de-personalizes them. This gives off the notion of âspecimenâ or âambient objectâ to people rather than âactive agentâ. A top down view of arthropods also makes their legs very visible, which for many people is what creeps them out. But what if we zoomed in on the face?
Perhaps then people might empathize more? You might say, itâs still quite alien. Arthropods do not emote. But if people can project faces read emotions even on inanimate objects like cars or cut fruit, why is it so unbelievable that people could then project attachment towards arthropods which actually do have faces? Of course, not all arthropods faces are created equal, they certainly come in a large variety.
Hence why I think this might be a good subject for a study. Make an online survey for participants, where they rate the faces of a variety of arthropod species on six metrics. Fear, disgust, cuteness, beauty, and two more metrics which I have not yet seen in these kind of studies, funniness and coolness. The first four are common in animal rating surveys, but the last two are things I have come up with since they are genuine emotional responses I have not seen accounted for. Something may not be âcuteâ or âbeautifulâ but it can definitely be very âcoolâ like the impressive jaws of a tiger beetle.
Or it could be very funny. Pycnogonids, for all their creepy reputation, have very dopey stupid looking faces. Tiny dot eyes and a big schnozz, like some mario enemy.
Each metric would be scored out of 5. Then the participant will be asked to identify the animal in the picture after rating them, and then it moves on to the next picture. The pictures will not come pre identified, because this may influence the rating scores. If someone already hates cockroaches and they see the animal pictured is labeled as a cockroach, they may be predisposed to rate it more negatively than they otherwise would have.
I think people might find the face of a louse rather cute so long as they donât know its a louse.
The aim of such a study would be two things. One, which arthropod, if any, has the most appealing facial morphology. Two, how accurately can people identify arthropods from the face alone. What would the winners of such a study be? Well, an obvious answer would be jumping spiders, but I think damselflies and Gigantocypris ostracods, and some weevils would be up there as well for cuteness at least.
What do you guys think? Would a survey of arthropods focused on just their faces be insightful?
