The SocialVidStim: a video database of positive and negative social evaluation stimuli for use in social cognitive neuroscience paradigms

Abstract

This paper describes the SocialVidStim—a database of video stimuli available to the scientific community depicting positive and negative social evaluative and neutral statements. The SocialVidStim comprises 53 diverse individuals reflecting the demographic makeup of the USA, ranging from 9 to 41 years old, saying 20–60 positive and 20–60 negative social evaluative statements (e.g. ‘You are a very trustworthy/annoying person’), and 20–60 neutral statements (e.g. ‘The sky is blue’), totaling 5793 videos post-production. The SocialVidStim are designed for use in behavioral and functional magetic resonance imaging paradigms, across developmental stages, in diverse populations. This study describes stimuli development and reports initial validity and reliability data on a subset videos (N = 1890) depicting individuals aged 18–41 years. Raters perceive videos as expected: positive videos elicit positively valenced ratings, negative videos elicit negatively valenced ratings and neutral videos are rated as neutral. Test–retest reliability data demonstrate intraclass correlations in the good-to-excellent range for negative and positive videos and the moderate range for neutral videos. We also report small effects on valence and arousal that should be considered during stimuli selection, including match between rater and actor sex and actor believability. The SocialVidStim is a resource for researchers and we offer suggestions for using the SocialVidStim in future research.