Self-focused attention,facial behavior,autonomic arousal and the experience of emotion

Two experiments examined alternative explanations for the Scheier and Carver(1977) results linking self-focused attention to increased responsivity to emotional stimuli. In both studies autonomic, expressive, and self-report measures of emotional arousal failed to confirm the earlier findings. An individual difference measure reported by others to parallel the effects of situationally manipulated self-attention also failed to confirm the previously reported findings. Though in direct contradiction to Scheier and Carver's results, the results are consistent with a facial feedback hypothesis and with previous findings on the effects of expressive inhibition on self-reports of emotional arousal.This research was supported in part by NSF grant 77-08926 to the first author and by NIMH grant MH 29446 to the third author, as well as by funds from the Lincoln Filene Endowment to Dartmouth College.     

Avoidance of the handicapped: an attributional ambiguity analysis.

We demonstrated a general strategy for detecting motives that people wish to conceal. The strategy consists of having people choose between two alternatives, one of which happens to satisfy the motive. By counterbalancing which one does so, it is possible to distill the motive by examining the pattern of choices that people make. The motive used in the demonstration is the desire we believe most people have to avoid the physically handicapped. Because they do not wish to reveal this desire, we predicted that they would be more likely to act on it if they could appear to choose on some other basis. In two studies we found that people avoided the handicapped more often if the decision to do so was also a decision between two movies and avoidance of the handicapped could masquerade as a movie preference.     

Why do fear and anger look the way they do? Form and social function in facial expressions

The origins of the appearances of anger and fear facial expressions are not well understood. The authors tested the hypothesis that such origins might lie in the expressions' resemblance to, respectively, mature and babyish faces in three studies. In Study 1, faces expressing anger and fear were judged to physically resemble mature and babyish faces. Study 2 indicated that characteristics associated specifically with babyishness are attributed to persons showing fear, whereas characteristics associated with maturity are attributed to persons showing anger. In Study 3, composite faces were used to minimize the possibility that the attributions were based on associations to the anger and fear emotions alone rather than to the physical resemblance of the expressions to static facial appearance cues. These results suggest that fear and anger expressions may serve socially adaptive purposes for those who show them, similar to the social adaptations associated with a babyish or mature facial appearance.     

Effects of direct and averted gaze on the perception of facially communicated emotion

Research has largely neglected the effects of gaze direction cues on the perception of facial expressions of emotion. It was hypothesized that when gaze direction matches the underlying behavioral intent (approach-avoidance) communicated by an emotional expression, the perception of that emotion would be enhanced (i.e., shared signal hypothesis). Specifically, the authors expected that (a) direct gaze would enhance the perception of approach-oriented emotions (anger and joy) and (b) averted eye gaze would enhance the perception of avoidance-oriented emotions (fear and sadness). Three studies supported this hypothesis. Study 1 examined emotional trait attributions made to neutral faces. Study 2 examined ratings of ambiguous facial blends of anger and fear. Study 3 examined the influence of gaze on the perception of highly prototypical expressions.     

Smiling and sad wrinkles: Age-related changes in the face and the perception of emotions and intentions

There is a common belief that wrinkles in the aging face reflect frequently experienced emotions and hence resemble these affective displays. This implies that the wrinkles and folds in elderly faces interfere with the perception of other emotions currently experienced by the elderly as well as with the inferences perceivers draw from these expressions. Whereas there is ample research on the impact of aging on emotion recognition, almost no research has focused on how emotions expressed by the elderly are perceived by others. The present research addresses this latter question. Young participants rated the emotion expressions and behavioral intentions of old and young faces displaying identical expressions. The findings suggest that emotions shown on older faces have reduced signal clarity and may consequently have less impact on inferences regarding behavioral intentions. Both effects can be expected to have negative consequences for rapport achieved in everyday interactions involving the elderly.     

Emotion in the neutral face: a mechanism for impression formation?

The current work examined contributions of emotion-resembling facial cues to impression formation. There exist common facial cues that make people look emotional, male or female, and from which we derive personality inferences. We first conducted a Pilot Study to assess these effects. We found that neutral female versus neutral male faces were rated as more submissive, affiliative, na?ve, honest, cooperative, babyish, fearful, happy, and less angry than neutral male faces. In our Primary Study, we then "warped" these same neutral faces over their corresponding anger and fear displays so the resultant facial appearance cues now structurally resembled emotion while retaining a neutral visage (e.g., no wrinkles, furrows, creases, etc.). The gender effects found in the Pilot Study were replicated in the Primary Study, suggesting clear stereotype-driven impressions. Critically, ratings of the neutral-over-fear warps versus neutral-over-anger warps also revealed a profile similar to the gender-based ratings, revealing perceptually driven impressions directly attributable to emotion overgeneralisation.     

Emotional expressions forecast approach-avoidance behavior

The contention that basic behavioral intentions are forecasted by emotional expressions has received surprisingly little empirical support. We introduce a behavioral task that gauges the speed with which movement of angry and fearful faces (toward or away from an expressor's gaze) are accurately detected. In two studies we found that perceivers were faster to correctly detect approaching anger faces (i.e., faces that moved in the direction of their own gaze). The opposite, however, was not true for fear expressions. These findings offer evidence that, at least for anger displays, the basic behavioral intent to approach is strongly transmitted and at very low-levels of processing, even priming congruent behavioral responses in observers. The null results for fear faces may indicate that these signal a “freezing” response or behavioral inhibition rather than flight per se. The results of this work are discussed in relation to contemporary theories of emotion.     

The influence of gender,social roles,and facial appearance on perceived emotionality

One of the most pervasive gender stereotypes in Western culture concerns expectations regarding men's and women's emotionality. Whereas men are expected to be anger prone, women are expected to smile more. At the same time, men are generally perceived as more facially dominant and facially dominant individuals are expected to show more anger. That is, both facial appearance and social role expectations would lead observers to expect men to show more anger. The present research had the goal to disentangle the unique contribution of these two factors. As it is impossible in our society to fully untangle the influence of these factors since they are highly confounded, we created an alien society where these factors could be unconfounded. In this alien world, Deluvia, child rearing is exclusively assumed by a third gender, the caregiver, whereas men and women share the same social roles. The facial appearance of the Deluvians was varied along the dominance continuum. The results showed that facially dominant Deluvians, regardless of gender, were expected to show more anger, disgust, and contempt and less happiness, fear, sadness, and surprise. Also, the nurturing caregivers were expected to show less anger, contempt, and disgust as well as more fear, sadness, and surprise, regardless of facial appearance. No effect of gender per se on perceived emotionality was found. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Acknowledging One's Stigma in the Interview Setting: Effective Strategy or Liability?1

The current research examines how members of stigmatized groups remediate hiring biases by adopting the strategy of directly acknowledging their stigmatizing condition within the interview context. In the first study, 123 participants responded to a videotaped interview involving an obese or physically disabled job applicant who either did or did not acknowledge a stigma. In the second study, 87 participants responded to scenarios that manipulated type of stigma, controllability of its onset, and acknowledgment. Results across both experiments reveal that applicants who did not acknowledge their obesity or physical disability in an employment context were not viewed differently from each other. However, if applicants did acknowledge, the perceived controllability of the stigmas strongly influenced how they would be perceived.     

Looking at You or Looking Elsewhere: The Influence of Head Orientation on the Signal Value of Emotional Facial Expressions

The role of horizontal head tilt for the perceptions of emotional facial expressions was examined. For this, a total of 387 participants rated facial expressions of anger, fear, sadness, and happiness, as well as neutral expressions shown by two men and two women in either a direct or an averted face angle. Decoding accuracy, attributions of dominance and affiliation, emotional reactions of the perceivers, and the felt desire to approach the expresser were assessed. Head position was found to strongly influence reactions to anger and fear but less so for other emotions. Direct anger expressions were more accurately decoded, perceived as less affiliative, and elicited higher levels of anxiousness and repulsion, as well as less desire to approach than did averted anger expressions. Conversely, for fear expressions averted faces elicited more negative affect in the perceiver. These findings suggest that horizontal head position is an important cue for the assessment of threat.