Infant Expressions in an Approach/Withdrawal Framework

Since the introduction of empirical methods for studying facial expression, the interpretation of infant facial expressions has generated much debate. The premise of this article is that action tendencies of approach and withdrawal constitute a core organizational feature of emotion in humans, promoting coherence of behavior, facial signaling, and physiological responses. The approach/withdrawal framework can provide a taxonomy of contexts and the neurobehavioral framework for the systematic, empirical study of individual differences in expression, physiology, and behavior within individuals as well as across contexts over time. By adopting this framework in developmental work on basic emotion processes, it may be possible to better understand the behavioral principles governing facial displays, and how individual differences in them are related to physiology and behavioral function in context.     

Children's Ability to Recognize Emotions From Partial and Complete Facial Expressions

The authors investigated children's ability to recognize emotions from the information available in the lower, middle, or upper face. School-age children were shown partial or complete facial expressions and asked to say whether they corresponded to a given emotion (anger, fear, surprise, or disgust). The results indicate that 5-year-olds were able to recognize fear, anger, and surprise from partial facial expressions. Fear was better recognized from the information located in the upper face than those located in the lower face. A similar pattern of results was found for anger, but only in girls. Recognition improved between 5 and 10 years old for surprise and anger, but not for fear and disgust.     

The Confusion of Fear and Surprise: A Developmental Study of the Perceptual-Attentional Limitation Hypothesis Using Eye Movements

The goal of the present study was to test the Perceptual-Attentional Limitation Hypothesis in children and adults by manipulating the distinctiveness between expressions and recording eye movements. Children 3–5 and 9–11 years old as well as adults were presented pairs of expressions and required to identify a target emotion. Children 3–5 years old were less accurate than those 9–11 years old and adults. All children viewed pictures longer than adults but did not spend more time attending to the relevant cues. For all participants, accuracy for the recognition of fear was lower than for surprise when the distinctive cue was in the brow only. They also took longer and spent more time in both the mouth and brow zones than when a cue was in the mouth or both areas. Adults and children 9–11 years old made more comparisons between the expressions when fear comprised a single distinctive cue in the brow than when the distinctive cue was in the mouth only or when both cues were present. Children 3–5 years old made more comparisons for brow only than both. The results of the present study extend on the Perceptual-Attentional Limitation Hypothesis showing an importance of both decoder and stimuli, and an interaction between decoder and stimuli characteristics.     

Interpreting President Barack Obama's Facial Displays of Emotion: Revisiting the Dartmouth Group

Charismatic presidents like John F. Kennedy, Ronald Reagan, and now Barack Obama have been able to overcome stereotype‐based barriers to political power by connecting emotionally with viewers, particularly through their nonverbal skills. In this study we focus on the facial displays of emotion by President Obama and how participants interpret them. This study builds upon the pioneering research of the Dartmouth Group concerning response to displays of happiness‐reassurance by political leaders. It will first replicate and extend upon existing research by using Ekman and Friesen's Facial Action Coding System (FACS) to characterize facial displays by President Obama, specifically three neutral displays and three different types of smiles. Second, this study replicates research carried out over two decades ago concerning individual differences in sex, ethnicity, and age cohort on response to political candidates culturally defined as Black. Video focusing on the head and torso were FACS coded and presented in a web‐based experiment to 79 participants working at a southern institution of higher education. The participants identified the emotions felt by President Obama on a scale ranging from “not at all” to “extremely” focusing on the basic emotion terms of: “Happy” and “Playful” (happiness‐reassurance) and “Angry” and “Disgusted” (anger‐threat). Findings suggest participants differentiate between subtle facial‐display differences and that there are differences based upon ethnicity and support for President Obama when they interpret his facial displays of emotion.     

A Factorial Analysis of Responses to the Comic as a Study in Personality

Modeling techniques were used to model moderate disclosure to high and low disclosers. Eighty female undergraduates (40 low disclosers and 40 high disclosers) listened to a model select items that were rated as moderate disclosures for discussion. Two modeling conditions were employed; in one condition the model was reinforced by the E (vicarious reinforcement), in the second condition the model was not reinforced. Two control conditions, one with the model present, the other with the model absent were also included. The results of two separate 2 × 4 × 2 repeated measures, hierarchical analyses of variance on the subject distance from modeled intimacy, and the number of moderate items selected on pre- and posttests, indicated that both modeling conditions were successful in producing moderation of self-disclosure.     

An epistemic and dynamic approach to abductive reasoning: Abductive problem and abductive solution

We propose a study of abductive reasoning addressing it as an epistemic process that involves both an agent?s information and the actions that modify this information. More precisely, we present and discuss definitions of an abductive problem and an abductive solution in terms of an agent?s information, that is, in terms of knowledge and beliefs. The discussion is then formalised by ‘implementing’ our definitions in a dynamic epistemic logic framework, where the properties of these definitions are studied, an epistemic action that represents the application of an abductive step is introduced, and an illustrative example is provided. A number of the most interesting properties of abductive reasoning (those highlighted by Peirce) are shown to be better modelled within this approach.     

Emotional expressions during early infant – father conversations

The present longitudinal and naturalistic study aimed to investigate fathers' and infants' facial expressions of emotions during paternal infant-directed speech. The microanalysis of infant and paternal facial expressions of emotion in the course of the naturalistic interactions of 11 infant – father dyads, from the 2nd to the 6th month, provided evidence that: (a) fathers and infants match their emotional states and attune their emotional intensity; (b) infants seem to match paternal facial emotional expressions more than vice versa; (c) the prevailing emotional states of each partner remain constant in the beginning and at the end of speech; and (d) the developmental trajectories of infant interest and paternal pleasure change significantly across the age range of 2 – 6 months and they seem to follow similar courses. These results are interpreted within the frame of the theory of innate intersubjectivity.     

情绪加工老龄化机制：表情的自动加工和控制加工视角

情绪加工老龄化已经成为老龄化研究的新热点, 但其内在机制仍然缺乏统一的解释。本研究以自动加工和控制加工为切入点, 综合行为实验、ERP和fMRI实验技术, 开展表情加工的老龄化研究, 从情绪与认知交互的角度进一步揭示情绪加工老龄化的内在机制。具体内容包括表情自动加工和控制加工的年龄差异及其神经机制, 表情自动加工与认知控制的相互作用, 以及个体差异在情绪加工老龄化中的作用等。本研究将加深对情绪加工老龄化的理解, 为相关理论模型的验证、修正和完善提供实证依据。     

Positive explorers: modeling dynamic control in normal aging

Situations in which there are multiple changes occurring all at once and which demand complex decisions to be made are common throughout life, but little is known about how normal aging influences performance on these types of scenarios. To determine performance differences associated with normal aging, we test older and younger adults in a dynamic control task. The task involves the control of a single output variable over time via multiple and uncertain input controls. The Single Limited Input, Dynamic Exploratory Responses (SLIDER) computational model, is implemented to determine the behavioral characteristics associated with normal aging in a dynamic control task. Model-based analysis demonstrates a unique performance signature profile associated with normal aging. Specifically, older adults exhibit a positivity effect in which they are more influenced by positively valenced feedback, congruent with previous research, as well as enhanced exploratory behavior.