Blinking is the rapid opening and closing movement of the eyelid to protect the eye, which is the visual organ. Blinking prevents the contamination of foreign substances by its movement. This is a corneal reflex in response to contact with the cornea or blowing air, and it can be confirmed until brain death due to a decrease in the level of consciousness (Tata, Yamada, Fukuda, 1993; Sakata, Yamada, 2017).

The “startle eyeblink reflex” is evoked by sudden, loud auditory stimuli. Since the startle reflex is stimulated by unpleasant emotions and moods and inhibited by pleasant emotions, the “startle probe paradigm” is used as a multifaceted method for evaluating human emotional states.

In this article, we review the history of research on quantitative evaluation of emotions and moods using the startle probe paradigm. We also describe our original study using olfactory stimuli as emotion-evoking stimuli. In addition, we review studies on drugs, genotypes, and gender differences that modulate baseline affect.

In this study, we examined the effects of lactate threshold bicycle exercise in cold water with lower muscle temperature on skeletal muscle oxygenation and glycolytic metabolism. Eight subjects in each water temperature condition (15 and 33°C) conducted 30-min lower-body water immersion followed by 30-min underwater bicycle exercise. As a result, tissue hypoxia was observed in the skeletal muscle oxygenation during the exercise performed with decreased muscle temperature, and significantly higher blood lactate concentration and respiratory exchange ratio would indicate an increase in glycolytic metabolism.

This study was a crossover trial that examined the effects of a 12-week peanut (Nakateyutaka) consumption on the cognitive function of community-dwelling elderly persons. These peanuts were cultivated in Kaneyama town, Yamagata Prefecture. Cognitive function was assessed using a computer-based test battery. During the peanut ingestion period, the verbal memory scores of the participants significantly increased post-intervention compared to their pre-intervention scores. Pre- and post-interventional changes in verbal memory and anger scores, which are part of a psychological index, showed a significantly negative correlation. In addition, there was no significant difference in the pre-and post-interventional urinary cortisol levels during the peanut ingestion period. However, during the control period, higher urinary cortisol levels were observed post-intervention than pre-intervention. The improvement of verbal memory through peanut consumption may involve the antioxidant effects of polyphenols (contained abundantly in peanuts), which can alter mood, specifically anger, and suppress the effects of increased stress levels.