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PubMed2005

An ERP study on facial expression of emotion: comparison of linguistic and visual semantic decoding.

The present research compared the semantic information processing of linguistic stimuli with semantic elaboration of nonlinguistic facial stimuli. To explore brain potentials (ERPs, event-related potentials) related to decoding facial expressions and the effect of semantic valence of the stimulus, we analyzed data for 20 normal subjects (M age = 23.6 yr., SD = 0.2). Faces with three basic emotional expressions (fear, happiness, and sadness from the 1976 Ekman and Friesen database), with three semantically anomalous expressions (with respect to their emotional content), and the neutral stimuli (face without an emotional content) were presented in a random order. Differences in peak amplitude of ERP were observed later for anomalous expressions compared with congruous expressions. In fact, the results demonstrated that the emotional anomalous faces elicited a higher negative peak at about 360 msec., distributed mainly over the posterior sites. The observed electrophysiological activity may represent specific cognitive processing underlying the comprehension of facial expressions in detection of semantic anomaly. The evidence is in favour of comparability of this negative deflection with the N400 ERP effect elicited by linguistic anomalies.

Adult↗
PubMed1992

Posed facial expressions of emotion in schizophrenia and depression.

The goals of the present study were to explore: (1) whether schizophrenics, depressives, and normals differ in their likelihood of expressing different emotions; and (2) whether the types of expressions subjects exhibit are associated with their level of reported depressive symptomatology. Subjects were asked to imagine: seeing, smelling, or tasting something disgusting; and having something wonderful happen to them. Subjects were asked to show the experimenter what their face would look like if these things happened. The groups differed in how frequently they exhibited anger or contempt in the first condition and happiness in the second condition. The depressives were most likely to exhibit anger/contempt and least likely to exhibit happiness. Using Beck Depression Inventory scores as dependent variables, there were significant interactions between diagnostic group and the type of facial expressions exhibited. The associations between facial expressions and BDI scores were in the opposite directions for depressives and schizophrenics.

Adult↗
PubMed1983

Spontaneous facial expressions occurring at onset of focal seizure activity.

Examination of the simultaneously recorded EEG and video taped behavior of patients during seizures activated by pentylenetetrazol-bemigride revealed a variety of spontaneous facial expressions at the electroclinical seizure onset. Neutral and sad expressions were observed most often, followed in frequency by expressions of fear, surprise, and happiness. Expressions of disgust and anger were rare. There was no consistent relation between side of seizure onset and type of spontaneous facial expression.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2004

Probing the psychophysiology of the airways: physical activity, experienced emotion, and facially expressed emotion.

This article reviews research on airway reactivity in health and asthma within a psychophysiological context, including the effects of physical activity, emotion induction, and manipulation of facial expression of emotion. Skeletal muscle activation leads to airway dilation, with vagal withdrawal being the most likely mechanism. Emotional arousal, in particular negative affect, leads to airway constriction, with evidence for a vagal pathway in depressive states and ventilatory contributions in positive affect. Laboratory-induced airway responses covary with reports of emotion-induced asthma and with lung function decline during negative mood in the field. Like physical activity, facial expression of emotion leads to airway dilation. However, these effects are small and less consistent in posed emotional expressions. The mechanisms of emotion-induced airway responses and potential benefits of emotional expression in asthma deserve further study.

Animals↗
PubMed2005

Facial expressiveness in patients with schizophrenia compared to depressed patients and nonpatient comparison subjects.

OBJECTIVE: Blunted affect is a major symptom in schizophrenia, and affective deficits clinically encompass deficits in expressiveness. Emotion research and ethological studies have shown that patients with schizophrenia are impaired in various modalities of expressiveness (posed and spontaneous emotion expressions, coverbal gestures, and smiles). Similar deficits have been described in depression, but comparative studies have brought mixed results. Our aim was to study and compare facial expressive behaviors related to affective deficits in patients with schizophrenia, depressed patients, and nonpatient comparison subjects. METHOD: Fifty-eight nondepressed inpatients with schizophrenia, 25 nonpsychotic inpatients with unipolar depression, and 25 nonpatient comparison subjects were asked to reproduce facial emotional expressions. Then the subjects were asked to speak about a specific emotion for 2 minutes. Each time, six cross-cultural emotions were tested. Facial emotional expressions were rated with the Facial Action Coding System. The number of facial coverbal gestures (facial expressions that are tied to speech) and the number of words were calculated. RESULTS: In relation to nonpatient comparison subjects, both patient groups were impaired for all expressive variables. Few differences were found between schizophrenia and depression: depressed subjects had less spontaneous expressions of other-than-happiness emotions, but overall, they appeared more expressive. Fifteen patients with schizophrenia were tested without and with typical or atypical antipsychotic medications: no differences could be found in study performance. CONCLUSIONS: The patients with schizophrenia and the patients with depression presented similar deficits in various expressive modalities: posed and spontaneous emotional expression, smiling, coverbal gestures, and verbal output.

Adult↗
PubMed1983

The independence of face identity and facial expression recognition mechanisms: relationship to sex and cognitive style.

Two tasks, one mapping the recognition of unfamiliar face identity and the other the identification of six facial expressions were unilaterally presented to field dependent and field independent individuals of both genders. Regardless of sex, field independent subjects showed faster-response times (RTs) in the left visual field (LVF) for face identity and for the identification of disgust and fear and faster RTs in the RVF for the identification of anger. A trend toward LVF superiority was found over the whole sample for the facial expression task; this effect was still present when the face identity task was partialled out, indicating the independence of the underlying mechanisms.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1990

Differences in asymmetric perception of facial expression in free-vision chimeric stimuli and reaction time.

Two forms of a Chimeric Faces Free-Vision Task used to estimate cerebral asymmetry for perceiving facial expression were given to young male subjects, n = 60 in a first session and n = 40 in a retest session. Test-retest and split-half reliabilities were high. As expected from assumptions of right-hemisphere specialization for processing expression, faces with left-sided smiles were more frequently judged as looking happier than those with right-sided smiles in both forms. However, there were individual differences in direction and extent of bias, which were systematically related to reaction time, right visual field-biased subjects being slower. Differences in lateral bias as well as in reaction time are assumed to reflect individual patterns of hemispheric activation, whereas the average left bias in the present male group may reflect right-hemisphere specialization for processing of facial expression.

Adult↗
PubMed1998

[Delays in recognizing facial expressions resulting from prolonged viewing of adaptation face stimuli].

The main purpose of the present study was to investigate the mechanism underlying fundamental dimensions in recognition of facial expressions, using the prolonged viewing method. Pictures of female faces were used, which displayed one of the following six: happiness, sadness, surprise, anger, disgust, and neutral expressions. In Experiment 1, the mean ratings of each expression on each picture were analyzed with principal component analysis (PCA). In Experiment 2, subjects orally judged the expressions of test faces following either one or 25 seconds of viewing of an adaptation face. Significant delays occurred in the prolonged viewing condition only when the adaptation face had a higher absolute value on 'pleasantness' the first component of PCA, than the test face. In contrast, adaptation faces that were high only on 'arousal,' the second component, produced no such effects. It was suggested that there are at least two subsystems involved in the recognition of facial expressions and that each system has different temporal characteristics.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1991

Recognition of affective facial expressions by children and adolescents with and without mental retardation.

Children and adolescents with mental retardation were compared with children and adolescents without mental retardation on their ability to recognize facial expressions. The groups were matched for either chronological age (CA) or mental age (MA). Children and adolescents with mental retardation recognized facial expressions less accurately than did subjects without retardation who were matched on CA. The MA-matched groups showed no differences in accuracy at the younger MA but a difference was found at the older MA. However, subjects categorized as having cultural-familial retardation did not differ from subjects without retardation matched for MA at either the younger or older MA. Results suggest that children with mental retardation are less able than children without retardation to develop emotional recognition skills by observational learning.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2005

Rapid perceptual integration of facial expression and emotional body language.

In our natural world, a face is usually encountered not as an isolated object but as an integrated part of a whole body. The face and the body both normally contribute in conveying the emotional state of the individual. Here we show that observers judging a facial expression are strongly influenced by emotional body language. Photographs of fearful and angry faces and bodies were used to create face-body compound images, with either matched or mismatched emotional expressions. When face and body convey conflicting emotional information, judgment of facial expression is hampered and becomes biased toward the emotion expressed by the body. Electrical brain activity was recorded from the scalp while subjects attended to the face and judged its emotional expression. An enhancement of the occipital P1 component as early as 115 ms after presentation onset points to the existence of a rapid neural mechanism sensitive to the degree of agreement between simultaneously presented facial and bodily emotional expressions, even when the latter are unattended.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2006

Neural responses to facial expressions of disgust but not fear are modulated by washing symptoms in OCD.

BACKGROUND: Washing symptoms in Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) are associated with increased trait sensitivity to disgust. This study explored neural systems underlying sensitivity to symptom-unrelated disgust and fear in OCD using functional neuroimaging. METHODS: Seventeen OCD subjects and 19 controls viewed facial expressions of disgust and fear (versus neutral) presented just above the level of conscious awareness in a backward masking paradigm. RESULTS: The OCD group showed greater activation than controls in the left ventrolateral prefrontal cortex, but reduced activation in the thalamus, to facial expressions of disgust. There were no between-group differences in response to fear. Further analysis using a median-split to divide OCD subjects into high and low washers suggested that the enhanced ventrolateral prefrontal cortex response was being driven by predominantly female OCD subjects with high washing symptoms. These subjects also reported higher levels of trait sensitivity to disgust. CONCLUSIONS: These findings are consistent with previous reports of increased response to symptom-relevant and generally disgusting stimuli in neural regions associated with disgust and autonomic response processing in OCD patients with prominent washing symptoms. Together, these findings point to increased sensitivity to disgust stimuli as a component of the pathophysiology of the washing/contamination symptom dimension of OCD.

Adult↗
PubMed2002

A method for obtaining 3-dimensional facial expressions and its standardization for use in neurocognitive studies.

Facial expressions of emotion are increasingly being used in neuroscience as probes for functional imaging and as stimuli for studying hemispheric specialization for face and emotion processing. Available facial stimuli are 2-dimensional and therefore, their orientation is fixed and poorly suited for examining asymmetries, they are often obtained under poorly specified conditions, usually posed, lack ethnic diversity, and are of restricted age range. We describe a method for accurately acquiring and reconstructing the geometry of the human face and for display of this reconstruction in a 3-dimensional format. We applied the method in a sample of 70 actors and 69 actresses expressing happiness, sadness, anger, fear and disgust, as well as neutral expressions. Each emotion was expressed under three levels of intensity and under both posed and evoked conditions. Resulting images are of high technical quality and are accurately identified by raters. The stimuli can be downloaded in digital form as 'movies' where angle and orientation can be manipulated for inclusion in functional imaging probes or in tests that can be administered as measures of individual differences in facial emotion processing. The database of emotional expressions can also be used as a standard for comparison with clinical populations.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2006

Developmental changes in infants' processing of happy and angry facial expressions: a neurobehavioral study.

Event-related brain potentials were measured in 7- and 12-month-old infants to examine the development of processing happy and angry facial expressions. In 7-month-olds a larger negativity to happy faces was observed at frontal, central, temporal and parietal sites (Experiment 1), whereas 12-month-olds showed a larger negativity to angry faces at occipital sites (Experiment 2). These data suggest that processing of these facial expressions undergoes development between 7 and 12 months: while 7-month-olds exhibit heightened sensitivity to happy faces, 12-month-olds resemble adults in their heightened sensitivity to angry faces. In Experiment 3 infants' visual preference was assessed behaviorally, revealing that the differences in ERPs observed at 7 and 12 months do not simply reflect differences in visual preference.

Analysis of Variance↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Facial expression of positive and negative emotions in patients with unipolar depression.

Neuropsychological research in major depression has generally been limited to the realm of cognition. This study focuses instead on the neuropsychology of affect. Emotional facial expression was examined in light of its presumed right cerebral hemisphere mediation and evidence for right hemisphere disorganization in major depression. Posed facial emotional expressions of four emotions were elicited and dynamically photographed in 30 unipolar depressives and 30 normal controls. Accuracy and emotional intensity of the expressions were rated by blind raters. Depressed patients were significantly impaired in the production of emotional facial expressions, particularly for positive ones. Several alternative explanations for the findings are discussed and further studies recommended.

Arousal↗
PubMed1992

Facial expressions of emotion: an old controversy and new findings.

Evidence on universals in facial expression of emotion and renewed controversy about how to interpret that evidence is discussed. New findings on the capability of voluntary facial action to generate changes in both autonomic and central nervous system activity are presented, as well as a discussion of the possible mechanisms relevant to this phenomenon. Finally, new work on the nature of smiling is reviewed which shows that it is possible to distinguish the smile when enjoyment is occurring from other types of smiling. Implications for the differences between voluntary and involuntary expression are considered.

Emotions↗
PubMed1992

Developmental changes in the recognition and comprehension of facial expression: implications for frontal lobe function.

Children aged 6-15 years old and adults (over 18) were given three tests designed to test perception and comprehension of facial expression. In the first test subjects were given two composite symmetrical faces made from the left or right half of a normal face, the subjects' task being to indicate which composite more closely resembled the original face. In the second test the subjects matched a series of photographs from Life magazine with key photographs of one of six distinct emotions (sad, fear, happy, anger, disgust, surprise). In the third test the subjects chose a key photograph that was appropriate for the face of a faceless character in a cartoon. On the composite faces test the subjects in all groups exhibited a preference for the left visual field composite, implying that all age groups were processing the faces in a similar manner. The results of the other two tests showed that there was an improvement in the perception of facial expression between the ages of 6 and 8 years, little change until about 13 years, and then a second improvement to adult performance at about 14 years. The performance of the 8- to 13-year-old children was similar to that of adult patients with frontal lobe injuries, which could be taken as evidence that the regions of the frontal lobe involved in the performance of these tasks may not be mature until about 14 years of age.

Adult↗
PubMed2003

A modulatory role for facial expressions in prosopagnosia.

Brain-damaged patients experience difficulties in recognizing a face (prosopagnosics), but they can still recognize its expression. The dissociation between these two face-related skills has served as a keystone of models of face processing. We now report that the presence of a facial expression can influence face identification. For normal viewers, the presence of a facial expression influences performance negatively, whereas for prosopagnosic patients, it improves performance dramatically. Accordingly, although prosopagnosic patients show a failure to process the facial configuration in the interest of face identification, that ability returns when the face shows an emotional expression. Accompanying brain-imaging results indicate activation in brain areas (amygdala, superior temporal sulcus, parietal cortex) outside the occipitotemporal areas normally activated for face identification and lesioned in these patients. This finding suggests a modulatory role of these areas in face identification that is independent of occipitotemporal face areas.

Adult↗
PubMed2004

Functional association of the amygdala and ventral prefrontal cortex during cognitive evaluation of facial expressions primed by masked angry faces: an event-related fMRI study.

The present study examined the functional association of the amygdala and right ventral prefrontal cortex (PFC) during cognitive evaluation of facial expressions. A situation was created where emotional valence of the stimuli was unconsciously manipulated by using subliminal affective priming. Twelve healthy volunteers were asked to evaluate the facial expressions of a target face (500-ms duration) such as "anger", "neutral", or "happy". All target faces expressed relatively weak anger. Just before the presentation of the target face, a prime of three conditions of 35-ms duration, angry face, neutral face, and white blank was presented. The subjects could not consciously identify the primes in this procedure. Activity in the right amygdala was greater with subliminal presentation of the angry prime compared with subliminal presentation of a neutral face or white-blank stimuli. Most importantly, the degree of activation of the right amygdala was negatively correlated with that of the right ventral PFC only with the anger prime. Furthermore, activation of the amygdala was positively correlated with rate of judgment when the subjects recognized anger in the target faces. These results are discussed in terms of the functional association between the right PFC and the amygdala and its influence on cognitive processing.

Adult↗