Experimental procedure
greeter
RECRUITMENT
In this study, the eligibility criteria for participant recruitment were age (between 18 and 35 years) and heterosexual orientation. All experimental procedures were approved by the Social Science Institutional Review Board at the University of Chicago. All experimental procedures took place between 11:30 AM and 5:30 PM. Participants always interacted with an experimenter, or “greeter”, of the same sex throughout the entire experimental session. Upon arrival to the research building, participants were taken by a “greeter” to the testing room, where they completed questionnaires for 20 minutes. An initial demographic survey asked information about participants’ age, ethnicity, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, marital or relationship status (single or in a relationship), etc. At the end of this period, they provided a baseline saliva sample. They then either took part in the Trier Social Stress Test or sat in a room doing nothing for a similar period of time as a control condition. Another saliva sample was collected after the TSST or the control condition (post-treatment), approximately fifteen minutes after the start of the TSST or control condition. Approximately ten to fifteen minutes after the TSST or control condition had ended, participants went through a brief social interaction task with a research assistant of the opposite sex. A final saliva sample (post-social interaction) was collected after the social interaction task. Upon completion of all procedures, participants were fully debriefed and given compensation.