Mutual Interaction between Genders with Stress or Non-Stress by Positive Stimulus Characteristics Using fNIRS

Gender is recognized as one of the most important factors to consider in stress researches, but it is not always true. Previous studies on gender have shown no behavioral or physiological differences between control and stress groups during neutral tasks independent of stress. Some studies also show that differences in hemodynamic responses are not based on gender in functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) fields. Under two conflicting stress cases using fNIRS, we aim not only to investigate gender effect presenting hemodynamic differences between genders but to confirm the interaction effects that mutually affect genders (males and females) and groups (control and stress). Our results indicate that the interaction effects as well as gender effects depend on the stress task types. Female's hemodynamic responses can clearly detect stress in positive condition tasks but not negative ones. Eventually, these findings suggest the possibility of detecting stress depends on stress-inducing task types.