Emotion recognition: The role of featural and configural face information

Several studies investigated the role of featural and configural information when processing facial identity. A lot less is known about their contribution to emotion recognition. In this study, we addressed this issue by inducing either a featural or a configural processing strategy (Experiment 1) and by investigating the attentional strategies in response to emotional expressions (Experiment 2). In Experiment 1, participants identified emotional expressions in faces that were presented in three different versions (intact, blurred, and scrambled) and in two orientations (upright and inverted). Blurred faces contain mainly configural information, and scrambled faces contain mainly featural information. Inversion is known to selectively hinder configural processing. Analyses of the discriminability measure (A′) and response times (RTs) revealed that configural processing plays a more prominent role in expression recognition than featural processing, but their relative contribution varies depending on the emotion. In Experiment 2, we qualified these differences between emotions by investigating the relative importance of specific features by means of eye movements. Participants had to match intact expressions with the emotional cues that preceded the stimulus. The analysis of eye movements confirmed that the recognition of different emotions rely on different types of information. While the mouth is important for the detection of happiness and fear, the eyes are more relevant for anger, fear, and sadness.     

In my mind, we all smile: A case of in-group favoritism

The goal of the present study was to examine whether a highly valued social behavior—the smile—is attributed more frequently to in-group than to out-group members. For this, participants were asked to read a vignette describing a protagonist in a non-emotional situation, and to choose a facial expression that would be appropriate to the context. For Study 1 the vignette depicted a potentially social context, whereas for Study 2, the context was strictly non-social. In both studies, participants of European descent attributed smiles more often to members of their in-group, whereas they attributed a larger number of neutral faces to out-group members. In a third study the same pattern of attributions was found for recent immigrants from French speaking African countries and from Asian countries. These results suggest the presence of an in-group bias in the attribution of smiles.     

Effects of facial expression on working memory

In long‐term memory (LTM) emotional content may both enhance and impair memory, however, disagreement remains whether emotional content exerts different effects on the ability to maintain and manipulate information over short intervals. Using a working‐memory (WM) recognition task requiring the monitoring of faces displaying facial expressions of emotion, participants judged each face as identical (target) or not (non‐target) to that presented 2 trials back (2‐back). Negative expression was better and faster recognised, illustrated by higher target discriminability and target detection. Positive and negative expressions also induced a more liberal detection bias compared with neutral. Taking the preceding item into account, additional accuracy impairment (negative preceding negative target) and enhancement effects (negative or positive preceding neutral target) appeared. This illustrates a differential modulation of WM based on the affective tone of the target (mirroring LTM enhancement‐ and recognition bias effects), and of the preceding item (enhanced and impaired target detection).     

Motor,affective and cognitive empathy in adolescence: Interrelations between facial electromyography and self-reported trait and state measures

This study examined interrelations of trait and state empathy in an adolescent sample. Self-reported affective trait empathy and cognitive trait empathy were assessed during a home visit. During a test session at the university, motor empathy (facial electromyography), and self-reported affective and cognitive state empathy were assessed in response to empathy-inducing film clips portraying happiness and sadness. Adolescents who responded with stronger motor empathy consistently reported higher affective state empathy. Adolescents' motor empathy was also positively related to cognitive state empathy, either directly or indirectly via affective state empathy. Whereas trait empathy was consistently, but modestly, related to state empathy with sadness, for state empathy with happiness few trait–state associations were found. Together, the findings provide support for the notion that empathy is a multi-faceted phenomenon. Motor, affective and cognitive empathy seem to be related processes, each playing a different role in the ability to understand and share others' feelings.     

Emotion recognition in children with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders

There is a limited amount of research that examines social-emotional functioning in children with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD), and the majority of it relies on parent and teacher reports of social impairments. Because these provide broad measures of social function, they fail to elucidate the underlying specific skills with which this group of children has difficulty. The current study examines emotion-recognition abilities in children with FASD, as it plays a central role in social interaction. Participants were 22 children with diagnosed FASD (ages 8–14), and age- and gender-matched typically developing controls. Tasks included measures of emotion recognition from three nonlinguistic modalities: facial expressions, emotional tone of voice, and body positioning and movement. Participant’s parents completed measures of adaptive and behavioral function that were related to children’s performance on aspects of emotion recognition. Overall, the results show that children with FASD have more difficulties with emotion recognition than typically developing age-matched peers, but these difficulties may not be clinically significant (e.g., smaller effect size) or may be specific to the age of the individual exhibiting the emotion (i.e., child vs. adult). These results are discussed in the context of previous studies.     

Overt congruent facial reaction to dynamic emotional expressions in 9–10-month-old infants

The current study aimed to extend the understanding of the early development of spontaneous facial reactions toward observed facial expressions. Forty-six 9- to 10-month-old infants observed video clips of dynamic human facial expressions that were artificially created with morphing technology. The infants’ facial responses were recorded, and the movements of the facial action unit 12 (e.g., lip-corner raising, associated with happiness) and facial action unit 4 (e.g., brow-lowering, associated with anger) were visually evaluated by multiple naïve raters. Results showed that (1) infants make congruent, observable facial responses to facial expressions, and (2) these specific facial responses are enhanced during repeated observation of the same emotional expressions. These results suggest the presence of observable congruent facial responses in the first year of life, and that they appear to be influenced by contextual information, such as the repetition of presentation of the target emotional expressions.     

自我客体化影响认知表现的研究现状

自我客体化的女性会内化他人的评价,把自己当做物品一样来定义和评价自我,并习惯性地对自己的身体以及外貌进行监测,从而导致身体羞耻、焦虑、“心流”体验的减少及身体内部感知的迟钝,并进一步造成更多的不良后果。以往的研究多关注于自我客体化在女性心理健康上造成的影响,很少有研究关注于自我客体户对认知表现的影响。本文梳理了自我客体户与认知表现的相关研究,以及自我客体户对认知表现可能的作用机制。未来研究需要从多方面来丰富自我客体化的操纵方式,通过实验的方式来检验自我客体化对认知表现的作用机制,以及考察不同的认知表现,并关注自我客体化对认知表现的累积效应。     

Facial gender confirmation surgery—review of the literature and recommendations for Version 8 of the WPATH Standards of Care

Facial gender confirmation surgery (FGCS), also popularly known and referred to in the scientific literature as facial feminization surgery (FFS), was previously treated as a collection of aesthetic procedures complementing other aspects of gender-confirming surgery. Recent literature on quality-of-life outcomes following FGCS has supported the substantial impact these procedures have on overall well-being and reduction of psychosocial sequelae in patients. The World Professional Association for Transgender Health Standards of Care, Version 7 (WPATH SOC 7), did not deem FGCS a medical necessity. Based on these new studies, increasing evidence points to the need to include FGCS among medically necessary gender-confirming surgeries, though more-prospective studies are needed. Updates to the WPATH SOC 8 are proposed based on available quality of life studies.     

女性面孔吸引力的加工及其对男性诚实道德行为的影响:一项ERP研究

研究考察了不同女性面孔吸引力情境对男性被试诚实道德决策行为的影响,同时采用ERP技术对社会情境中面孔吸引力的信息加工方式特点进行探究。结果发现,高面孔吸引力记录员情境中被试倾向更加真实地报告自己的预测结果而表现出更多诚实的道德决策;ERP结果则发现高吸引力记录员面孔较之于低吸引力记录员面孔在反应提示界面在大脑中后部诱发更大的早期N200成分。结果提示,在与面孔审美评价无关的社会情境中个体面孔的吸引力信息能够被快速识别与自动化加工,同时也会直接促进他人自身的道德行为水平。