Scientists work to unravel blushing

Health in a Heartbeat

You’re pouring yourself a cup of coffee while chatting up the new boss, and you get distracted — subsequently spilling it all over. You feel your face turn beet red, and it’s not the first time. After all, blushing is a universal part of the human experience.

Now, researchers are trying to understand why.

Using MRI scans to track brain activity, teams from the Netherlands and Italy are exploring the neural mechanisms behind blushing. Notably, the behavior is more than just a physical reaction; it’s tied to our brain’s response to social judgment, especially during adolescence.

To trigger a blushing response, the adolescent girls who participated in the study took part in two lab sessions. In the first, they sang challenging karaoke songs, and in the second, they watched videos of their own performances. Raising the stakes, researchers told them an audience would be watching their recordings.

Ultimately, the teens blushed more when viewing their own videos compared with others. Brain scans revealed that blushing was linked to increased activity in the cerebellum, known for its role in movement and coordination, and heightened activation in early visual areas. That suggests for these teens, seeing themselves on screen was something that dominated their attention.

The next area of study may include investigating how blushing works in even younger children, before they are as aware of their peers.

In the future, when you find yourself blushing, remember there’s a lot happening in your brain — and you’re in great, human species-wide company. In other words: It happens to all of us.