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Beyond Face Value: Does Involuntary Emotional Anticipation Shape the Perception of Dynamic Facial Expressions?

Emotional facial expressions are immediate indicators of the affective dispositions of others. Recently it has been shown that early stages of social perception can already be influenced by (implicit) attributions made by the observer about the agent’s mental state and intentions. In the current stu...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Palumbo, Letizia, Jellema, Tjeerd
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2013
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3569428/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23409112
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0056003
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author Palumbo, Letizia
Jellema, Tjeerd
author_facet Palumbo, Letizia
Jellema, Tjeerd
author_sort Palumbo, Letizia
collection PubMed
description Emotional facial expressions are immediate indicators of the affective dispositions of others. Recently it has been shown that early stages of social perception can already be influenced by (implicit) attributions made by the observer about the agent’s mental state and intentions. In the current study possible mechanisms underpinning distortions in the perception of dynamic, ecologically-valid, facial expressions were explored. In four experiments we examined to what extent basic perceptual processes such as contrast/context effects, adaptation and representational momentum underpinned the perceptual distortions, and to what extent ‘emotional anticipation’, i.e. the involuntary anticipation of the other’s emotional state of mind on the basis of the immediate perceptual history, might have played a role. Neutral facial expressions displayed at the end of short video-clips, in which an initial facial expression of joy or anger gradually morphed into a neutral expression, were misjudged as being slightly angry or slightly happy, respectively (Experiment 1). This response bias disappeared when the actor’s identity changed in the final neutral expression (Experiment 2). Videos depicting neutral-to-joy-to-neutral and neutral-to-anger-to-neutral sequences again produced biases but in opposite direction (Experiment 3). The bias survived insertion of a 400 ms blank (Experiment 4). These results suggested that the perceptual distortions were not caused by any of the low-level perceptual mechanisms (adaptation, representational momentum and contrast effects). We speculate that especially when presented with dynamic, facial expressions, perceptual distortions occur that reflect ‘emotional anticipation’ (a low-level mindreading mechanism), which overrules low-level visual mechanisms. Underpinning neural mechanisms are discussed in relation to the current debate on action and emotion understanding.
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spelling pubmed-35694282013-02-13 Beyond Face Value: Does Involuntary Emotional Anticipation Shape the Perception of Dynamic Facial Expressions? Palumbo, Letizia Jellema, Tjeerd PLoS One Research Article Emotional facial expressions are immediate indicators of the affective dispositions of others. Recently it has been shown that early stages of social perception can already be influenced by (implicit) attributions made by the observer about the agent’s mental state and intentions. In the current study possible mechanisms underpinning distortions in the perception of dynamic, ecologically-valid, facial expressions were explored. In four experiments we examined to what extent basic perceptual processes such as contrast/context effects, adaptation and representational momentum underpinned the perceptual distortions, and to what extent ‘emotional anticipation’, i.e. the involuntary anticipation of the other’s emotional state of mind on the basis of the immediate perceptual history, might have played a role. Neutral facial expressions displayed at the end of short video-clips, in which an initial facial expression of joy or anger gradually morphed into a neutral expression, were misjudged as being slightly angry or slightly happy, respectively (Experiment 1). This response bias disappeared when the actor’s identity changed in the final neutral expression (Experiment 2). Videos depicting neutral-to-joy-to-neutral and neutral-to-anger-to-neutral sequences again produced biases but in opposite direction (Experiment 3). The bias survived insertion of a 400 ms blank (Experiment 4). These results suggested that the perceptual distortions were not caused by any of the low-level perceptual mechanisms (adaptation, representational momentum and contrast effects). We speculate that especially when presented with dynamic, facial expressions, perceptual distortions occur that reflect ‘emotional anticipation’ (a low-level mindreading mechanism), which overrules low-level visual mechanisms. Underpinning neural mechanisms are discussed in relation to the current debate on action and emotion understanding. Public Library of Science 2013-02-11 /pmc/articles/PMC3569428/ /pubmed/23409112 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0056003 Text en © 2013 Palumbo, Jellema http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Palumbo, Letizia
Jellema, Tjeerd
Beyond Face Value: Does Involuntary Emotional Anticipation Shape the Perception of Dynamic Facial Expressions?
title Beyond Face Value: Does Involuntary Emotional Anticipation Shape the Perception of Dynamic Facial Expressions?
title_full Beyond Face Value: Does Involuntary Emotional Anticipation Shape the Perception of Dynamic Facial Expressions?
title_fullStr Beyond Face Value: Does Involuntary Emotional Anticipation Shape the Perception of Dynamic Facial Expressions?
title_full_unstemmed Beyond Face Value: Does Involuntary Emotional Anticipation Shape the Perception of Dynamic Facial Expressions?
title_short Beyond Face Value: Does Involuntary Emotional Anticipation Shape the Perception of Dynamic Facial Expressions?
title_sort beyond face value: does involuntary emotional anticipation shape the perception of dynamic facial expressions?
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3569428/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23409112
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0056003
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