Neural processing of facial expressions as modulators of communicative intention

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jalil Rasgado-Toledo ◽  
Elizabeth Valles-Capetillo ◽  
Averi Giudicessi ◽  
Magda Giordano
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expression ◽  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Speech Acts ◽  
Traditional Approach ◽  
Contextual Information ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Emotional Expressions ◽  
Brain Response ◽  
Communicative Intention ◽  
Neuroimaging Data

Speakers use a variety of contextual information, such as facial emotional expressions for the successful transmission of their message. Listeners must decipher the meaning by understanding the intention behind it (Recanati, 1986). A traditional approach to the study of communicative intention has been through speech acts (Escandell, 2006). The objective of the present study is to further the understanding of the influence of facial expression to the recognition of communicative intention. The study sought to: verify the reliability of facial expressions recognition, find if there is an association between a facial expression and a category of speech acts, test if words contain an intentional load independent of the facial expression presented, and test whether facial expressions can modify an utterance’s communicative intention and the neural correlates associated using univariate and multivariate approaches. We found that previous observation of facial expressions associated with emotions can modify the interpretation of an assertive utterance that followed the facial expression. The hemodynamic brain response to an assertive utterance was moderated by the preceding facial expression and that classification based on the emotions expressed by the facial expression could be decoded by fluctuations in the brain’s hemodynamic response during the presentation of the assertive utterance. Neuroimaging data showed activation of regions involved in language, intentionality and face recognition during the utterance’s reading. Our results indicate that facial expression is a relevant contextual cue that decodes the intention of an utterance, and during decoding it engages different brain regions in agreement with the emotion expressed.

Capacity-Free Automatic Processing of Facial Expressions of Emotion

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joshua W Maxwell ◽  
Eric Ruthruff ◽  
michael joseph
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expression ◽  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Face Processing ◽  
Emotional Expressions ◽  
Facial Expression Of Emotion ◽  
Expression Of Emotion ◽  
Facial Expressions Of Emotion ◽  
Correspondence Effect ◽  
Experimental Logic ◽  
Face Task

Are facial expressions of emotion processed automatically? Some authors have not found this to be the case (Tomasik et al., 2009). Here we revisited the question with a novel experimental logic – the backward correspondence effect (BCE). In three dual-task studies, participants first categorized a sound (Task 1) and then indicated the location of a target face (Task 2). In Experiment 1, Task 2 required participants to search for one facial expression of emotion (angry or happy). We observed positive BCEs, indicating that facial expressions of emotion bypassed the central attentional bottleneck and thus were processed in a capacity-free, automatic manner. In Experiment 2, we replicated this effect but found that morphed emotional expressions (which were used by Tomasik) were not processed automatically. In Experiment 3, we observed similar BCEs for another type of face processing previously shown to be capacity-free – identification of familiar faces (Jung et al., 2013). We conclude that facial expressions of emotion are identified automatically when sufficiently unambiguous.

scholarly journals Changes in functional connectivity associated with facial expression processing over the working adult lifespan

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Murray ◽  
Justin O'Brien ◽  
Veena Kumari
Keyword(s):  
Functional Connectivity ◽  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Brain Connectivity ◽  
Negative Emotions ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Emotional Expressions ◽  
Expression Recognition ◽  
Frontal Pole ◽  
Adult Lifespan ◽  
Age Related

The recognition of negative emotions from facial expressions is shown to decline across the adult lifespan, with some evidence that this decline begins around middle age. While some studies have suggested ageing may be associated with changes in neural response to emotional expressions, it is not known whether ageing is associated with changes in the network connectivity associated with processing emotional expressions. In this study, we examined the effect of participant age on whole-brain connectivity to various brain regions that have been associated with connectivity during emotion processing: the left and right amygdalae, medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC), and right posterior superior temporal sulcus (rpSTS). The study involved healthy participants aged 20-65 who viewed facial expressions displaying anger, fear, happiness, and neutral expressions during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). We found effects of age on connectivity between the left amygdala and voxels in the occipital pole and cerebellum, between the right amygdala and voxels in the frontal pole, and between the rpSTS and voxels in the orbitofrontal cortex, but no effect of age on connectivity with the mPFC. Furthermore, ageing was more greatly associated with a decline in connectivity to the left amygdala and rpSTS for negative expressions in comparison to happy and neutral expressions, consistent with the literature suggesting a specific age-related decline in the recognition of negative emotions. These results add to the literature surrounding ageing and expression recognition by suggesting that changes in underlying functional connectivity might contribute to changes in recognition of negative facial expressions across the adult lifespan.

scholarly journals Statistical Pattern Recognition Reveals Shared Neural Signatures for Displaying and Recognizing Specific Facial Expressions

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sofia Volynets ◽  
Dmitry Smirnov ◽  
Heini Saarimäki ◽  
Lauri Nummenmaa
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expression ◽  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Classification Accuracy ◽  
Facial Expression Recognition ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Substantial Improvement ◽  
Expression Recognition ◽  
Core System ◽  
Bayesian Logistic Regression ◽  
Neural Signatures

AbstractHuman neuroimaging and behavioural studies suggest that somatomotor “mirroring” of seen facial expressions may support their recognition. Here we show that viewing specific facial expressions triggers the representation corresponding to that expression in the observer’s brain. Twelve healthy female volunteers underwent two separate fMRI sessions: one where they observed and another where they displayed three types of basic facial expressions (joy, anger and disgust). Pattern classifier based on Bayesian logistic regression was trained to classify facial expressions i) within modality (trained and tested with data recorded while observing or displaying expressions) and ii) between modalities (trained with data recorded while displaying expressions and tested with data recorded while observing the expressions). Cross-modal classification was performed in two ways: with and without functional realignment of the data across observing / displaying conditions. All expressions could be accurately classified within and also across modalities. Brain regions contributing most to cross-modal classification accuracy included primary motor and somatosensory cortices. Functional realignment led to only minor increases in cross-modal classification accuracy for most of the examined ROIs. Substantial improvement was observed in the occipito-ventral components of the core system for facial expression recognition. Altogether these results support the embodied emotion recognition model and show that expression-specific somatomotor neural signatures could support facial expression recognition.

Patterns of Emotion Attribution are Affected in Patients with Schizophrenia

2015 ◽  
Vol 18 ◽  
Author(s):  
María Verónica Romero-Ferreiro ◽  
Luis Aguado ◽  
Javier Rodriguez-Torresano ◽  
Tomás Palomo ◽  
Roberto Rodriguez-Jimenez
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expression ◽  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Emotional Expressions ◽  
Facial Affect Recognition ◽  
Emotional States ◽  
Cognitive Representation ◽  
Novel Approach ◽  
Emotion Label ◽  
Poorly Differentiated ◽  
Emotion Labels

AbstractDeficits in facial affect recognition have been repeatedly reported in schizophrenia patients. The hypothesis that this deficit is caused by poorly differentiated cognitive representation of facial expressions was tested in this study. To this end, performance of patients with schizophrenia and controls was compared in a new emotion-rating task. This novel approach allowed the participants to rate each facial expression at different times in terms of different emotion labels. Results revealed that patients tended to give higher ratings to emotion labels that did not correspond to the portrayed emotion, especially in the case of negative facial expressions (p < .001, η2 = .131). Although patients and controls gave similar ratings when the emotion label matched with the facial expression, patients gave higher ratings on trials with "incorrect" emotion labels (ps < .05). Comparison of patients and controls in a summary index of expressive ambiguity showed that patients perceived angry, fearful and happy faces as more emotionally ambiguous than did the controls (p < .001, η2 = .135). These results are consistent with the idea that the cognitive representation of emotional expressions in schizophrenia is characterized by less clear boundaries and a less close correspondence between facial configurations and emotional states.

Judgements of facial expressions of emotions in context and no-context Conditions

1984 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
pp. 29-35
Author(s):  
Michael P. O'Driscoll ◽  
Barry L. Richardson ◽  
Dianne B. Wuillemin
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Impression Formation ◽  
Person Perception ◽  
Contextual Information ◽  
Experimental Studies ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Emotion Perception ◽  
Important Variable ◽  
Emotional Expressions ◽  
The Face

Thirty photographs depicting diverse emotional expressions were shown to a sample of Melanesian students who were assigned to either a face plus context or face alone condition. Significant differences between the two groups were obtained in a substantial proportion of cases on Schlosberg's Pleasant Unpleasant, and Attention – Rejection scales and the emotional expressions were judged to be appropriate to the context. These findings support the suggestion that the presence or absence of context is an important variable in the judgement of emotional expression and lend credence to the universal process theory.Research on perception of emotions has consistently illustrated that observers can accurately judge emotions in facial expressions (Ekman, Friesen, & Ellsworth, 1972; Izard, 1971) and that the face conveys important information about emotions being experienced (Ekman & Oster, 1979). In recent years, however, a question of interest has been the relative contributions of facial cues and contextual information to observers' overall judgements. This issue is important for theoretical and methodological reasons. From a theoretical viewpoint, unravelling the determinants of emotion perception would enhance our understanding of the processes of person perception and impression formation and would provide a framework for research on interpersonal communication. On methodological grounds, the researcher's approach to the face versus context issue can influence the type of research procedures used to analyse emotion perception. Specifically, much research in this field has been criticized for use of posed emotional expressions as stimuli for observers to evaluate. Spignesi and Shor (1981) have noted that only one of approximately 25 experimental studies has utilized facial expressions occurring spontaneously in real-life situations.

Suppression of Facial Mimicry of Negative Facial Expressions in an Incongruent Context

2018 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 160-171 ◽  
Author(s):  
Léonor Philip ◽  
Jean-Claude Martin ◽  
Céline Clavel
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expression ◽  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Affective Priming ◽  
Emotional Expressions ◽  
Facial Electromyography ◽  
Emotional Cues ◽  
Priming Task ◽  
Priming Word ◽  
Affective Priming Task ◽  
Neutral Expression

Abstract. People react with Rapid Facial Reactions (RFRs) when presented with human facial emotional expressions. Recent studies show that RFRs are not always congruent with emotional cues. The processes underlying RFRs are still being debated. In our study described herein, we manipulate the context of perception and its influence on RFRs. We use a subliminal affective priming task with emotional labels. Facial electromyography (EMG) (frontalis, corrugator, zygomaticus, and depressor) was recorded while participants observed static facial expressions (joy, fear, anger, sadness, and neutral expression) preceded/not preceded by a subliminal word (JOY, FEAR, ANGER, SADNESS, or NEUTRAL). For the negative facial expressions, when the priming word was congruent with the facial expression, participants displayed congruent RFRs (mimicry). When the priming word was incongruent, we observed a suppression of mimicry. Happiness was not affected by the priming word. RFRs thus appear to be modulated by the context and type of emotion that is presented via facial expressions.

scholarly journals Statistical pattern recognition reveals shared neural signatures for displaying and recognizing specific facial expressions

2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (8) ◽  
pp. 803-813
Author(s):  
Sofia Volynets ◽  
Dmitry Smirnov ◽  
Heini Saarimäki ◽  
Lauri Nummenmaa
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expression ◽  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Classification Accuracy ◽  
Facial Expression Recognition ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Substantial Improvement ◽  
Expression Recognition ◽  
Core System ◽  
Bayesian Logistic Regression ◽  
Neural Signatures

Abstract Human neuroimaging and behavioural studies suggest that somatomotor ‘mirroring’ of seen facial expressions may support their recognition. Here we show that viewing specific facial expressions triggers the representation corresponding to that expression in the observer’s brain. Twelve healthy female volunteers underwent two separate fMRI sessions: one where they observed and another where they displayed three types of facial expressions (joy, anger and disgust). Pattern classifier based on Bayesian logistic regression was trained to classify facial expressions (i) within modality (trained and tested with data recorded while observing or displaying expressions) and (ii) between modalities (trained with data recorded while displaying expressions and tested with data recorded while observing the expressions). Cross-modal classification was performed in two ways: with and without functional realignment of the data across observing/displaying conditions. All expressions could be accurately classified within and also across modalities. Brain regions contributing most to cross-modal classification accuracy included primary motor and somatosensory cortices. Functional realignment led to only minor increases in cross-modal classification accuracy for most of the examined ROIs. Substantial improvement was observed in the occipito-ventral components of the core system for facial expression recognition. Altogether these results support the embodied emotion recognition model and show that expression-specific somatomotor neural signatures could support facial expression recognition.

scholarly journals Recognition of peripherally exposed emotional expressions

2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 16-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
A.V. Zhegallo
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expression ◽  
Latent Period ◽  
Facial Expressions ◽  
High Accuracy ◽  
Face Image ◽  
Emotional Expressions ◽  
Sufficient Condition ◽  
Emotional Facial Expressions ◽  
The Face ◽  
Exposition Time

The study investigates the specifics of recognition of emotional facial expressions in peripherally exposed facial expressions, while exposition time was shorter compared to the duration of the latent period of a saccade towards the exposed image. The study showed that recognition of peripherical perception reproduces the patterns of the choice of the incorrect responses. The mutual mistaken recognition is common for the facial expressions of a fear, anger and surprise. In the case of worsening of the conditions of recognition, calmness and grief as facial expression were included in the complex of a mutually mistakenly identified expressions. The identification of the expression of happiness deserves a special attention, because it can be mistakenly identified as different facial expression, but other expressions are never recognized as happiness. Individual accuracy of recognition varies from 0.29 to 0.80. The sufficient condition of a high accuracy in recognition was the recognition of the facial expressions using peripherical vision without making a saccade in the direction of the face image exposed.

scholarly journals Recognition of facial expressions during step-function stroboscopic presentation

2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 50-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
V.A. Barabanschikov ◽  
O.A. Korolkova ◽  
E.A. Lobodinskaya
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expression ◽  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Recognition Rate ◽  
Step Function ◽  
Emotional Expressions ◽  
Expression Recognition ◽  
Recognition Of Facial Expressions ◽  
Medium Intensity ◽  
Neutral Face ◽  
Presentation Time

We studied the perception of human facial emotional expressions during step-function stroboscopic presentation of changing mimics. Consecutive stages of each of the six basic facial expressions were pre sented to the participants: neutral face (300 ms) — expression of medium intensity (10—40 ms) — intense expression (30—120 ms) — expression of medium intensity (10—40 ms) — neutral face (100 ms). Alternative forced choice task was used to categorize the facial expressions. The results were compared to previous studies (Barabanschikov, Korolkova, Lobodinskaya, 2015; 2016), conducted using the same paradigm but with boxcar-function change of the expression: neutral face — intense expression — neutral face. We found that the dynamics of facial expression recognition, as well as errors and recognition time are almost identical in conditions of boxcar- and step-function presentation. One factor influencing the recognition rate is the proportion of presentation time of static (neutral) and changing (facial expression) aspects of the stimulus. In suboptimal conditions of facial expression perception (minimal presentation time of 10+30+10 ms and reduced intensity of expressions) we revealed stroboscopic sensibilization — a previously described phenomenon of enhanced recognition rate of low-attractive expressions (disgust, sadness, fear and anger), which has been previously found in conditions of boxcar-function presentation of expressions. We confirmed the similarity of influence of real and apparent motion on the recognition of basic facial emotional expressions.

Recognition of Emotional Facial Expressions: The Role of Facial and Contextual Information in the Accuracy of Recognition

2012 ◽  
Vol 110 (1) ◽  
pp. 338-350 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mariano Chóliz ◽  
Enrique G. Fernández-Abascal
Keyword(s):  
Facial Expression ◽  
Facial Expressions ◽  
Facial Expression Recognition ◽  
Recognition Accuracy ◽  
Contextual Information ◽  
Central Area ◽  
Expression Recognition ◽  
Emotional Facial Expressions ◽  
Basic Emotions

Recognition of emotional facial expressions is a central area in the psychology of emotion. This study presents two experiments. The first experiment analyzed recognition accuracy for basic emotions including happiness, anger, fear, sadness, surprise, and disgust. 30 pictures (5 for each emotion) were displayed to 96 participants to assess recognition accuracy. The results showed that recognition accuracy varied significantly across emotions. The second experiment analyzed the effects of contextual information on recognition accuracy. Information congruent and not congruent with a facial expression was displayed before presenting pictures of facial expressions. The results of the second experiment showed that congruent information improved facial expression recognition, whereas incongruent information impaired such recognition.

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