Jao312

One of the main focuses of our lab is the circuits of "liking".
One measurements for "liking" (positive affective responses)is tongue protrusion.
For example, if you give rats, monkey, human babies and other animals sucrose solution,
they would start doing tongue protrusion as if saying "yummy, i like it!"
Usually the more animals like a certain solution, the more tongue protrusion they would do.
So, tongue protrusion is like an index of the level of "liking".

As a grad student in a liking/wanting lab,
I have spent at least half of my data analysis time watching rats' tongues.
"Is he doing tongue protrusion?" I would stare at my rats' mouths and ask myself.
You know, rat tongues aren't all that big..and sometimes it's hard to tell.

Today, I was reading news about election in Taiwan on CNN webpage.
When I clicked on this picture, my first thought was, "is he doing tongue protrusion?"
I saved the image and named it "tongue protrusion of victory!"

I think I am the first person in the world that discovered
tongue protrusion can happen when winning an election.
I guess that means Ma not only wanted to win but also "liked it"!