The development of the explicit recognition of facial expressions of emotions can be affected by childhood maltreatment experiences. A previous study demonstrated the existence of an explicit recognition bias for angry facial expressions among a population of adolescent Sierra Leonean street-boys exposed to high levels of maltreatment. In the present study, the recognition bias for angry facial expressions was investigated in a younger population of street-children and age-matched controls. Participants performed a forced-choice facial expressions recognition task. Recognition bias was measured as participants’ tendency to over-attribute anger label to other negative facial expressions. Participants’ heart rate was assessed and related to their behavioral performance, as index of their stress-related physiological responses. Results demonstrated the presence of a recognition bias for angry facial expressions among street-children, also pinpointing a similar, although significantly less pronounced, tendency among controls. Participants’ performance was controlled for age, cognitive and educational levels and for naming skills. None of these variables influenced the recognition bias for angry facial expressions. Differently, a significant effect of heart rate on participants’ tendency to use anger label was evidenced. Taken together, these results suggest that childhood exposure to maltreatment experiences amplifies children’s “pre-existing bias” for anger labeling in forced-choice emotion recognition task. Moreover, they strengthen the thesis according to which the recognition bias for angry facial expressions is a manifestation of a functional adaptive mechanism that tunes victim’s perceptive and attentive focus on salient environmental social stimuli.
Facial mimicry and vagal regulation represent two crucial physiological responses to others’ facial expressions of emotions. Facial mimicry, defined as the automatic, rapid and congruent electromyographic activation to others’ facial expressions, is implicated in empathy, emotional reciprocity and emotions recognition. Vagal regulation, quantified by the computation of Respiratory Sinus Arrhythmia (RSA), exemplifies the autonomic adaptation to contingent social cues. Although it has been demonstrated that childhood maltreatment induces alterations in the processing of the facial expression of emotions, both at an explicit and implicit level, the effects of maltreatment on children’s facial mimicry and vagal regulation in response to facial expressions of emotions remain unknown. The purpose of the present study was to fill this gap, involving 24 street-children (maltreated group) and 20 age-matched controls (control group). We recorded their spontaneous facial electromyographic activations of corrugator and zygomaticus muscles and RSA responses during the visualization of the facial expressions of anger, fear, joy and sadness. Results demonstrated a different impact of childhood maltreatment on facial mimicry and vagal regulation. Maltreated children did not show the typical positive-negative modulation of corrugator mimicry. Furthermore, when only negative facial expressions were considered, maltreated children demonstrated lower corrugator mimicry than controls. With respect to vagal regulation, whereas maltreated children manifested the expected and functional inverse correlation between RSA value at rest and RSA response to angry facial expressions, controls did not. These results describe an early and divergent functional adaptation to hostile environment of the two investigated physiological mechanisms. On the one side, maltreatment leads to the suppression of the spontaneous facial mimicry normally concurring to empathic understanding of others’ emotions. On the other side, maltreatment forces the precocious development of the functional synchronization between vagal regulation and threatening social cues facilitating the recruitment of fight-or-flight defensive behavioral strategies.
One of the crucial features defining basic emotions and their prototypical facial expressions is their value for survival. Childhood traumatic experiences affect the effective recognition of facial expressions of negative emotions, normally allowing the recruitment of adequate behavioral responses to environmental threats. Specifically, anger becomes an extraordinarily salient stimulus unbalancing victims’ recognition of negative emotions. Despite the plethora of studies on this topic, to date, it is not clear whether this phenomenon reflects an overall response tendency toward anger recognition or a selective proneness to the salience of specific facial expressive cues of anger after trauma exposure. To address this issue, a group of underage Sierra Leonean Ebola virus disease survivors (mean age 15.40 years, SE 0.35; years of schooling 8.8 years, SE 0.46; 14 males) and a control group (mean age 14.55, SE 0.30; years of schooling 8.07 years, SE 0.30, 15 males) performed a forced-choice chimeric facial expressions recognition task. The chimeric facial expressions were obtained pairing upper and lower half faces of two different negative emotions (selected from anger, fear and sadness for a total of six different combinations). Overall, results showed that upper facial expressive cues were more salient than lower facial expressive cues. This priority was lost among Ebola virus disease survivors for the chimeric facial expressions of anger. In this case, differently from controls, Ebola virus disease survivors recognized anger regardless of the upper or lower position of the facial expressive cues of this emotion. The present results demonstrate that victims’ performance in the recognition of the facial expression of anger does not reflect an overall response tendency toward anger recognition, but rather the specific greater salience of facial expressive cues of anger. Furthermore, the present results show that traumatic experiences deeply modify the perceptual analysis of philogenetically old behavioral patterns like the facial expressions of emotions.
Crimes against the public administration Index Number of crimes against the public administration over the number of public servants Table A1 (continued) Voice and accountability Social cooperatives Absolute value Social cooperatives per 100 000 residents ISTAT (2001) s Associations Absolute value Associations per 100 000 residents ISTAT (2004) t Election participation Turnout (%) 2001 general election Interior Ministry (2001) u Books published Absolute value Books published ISTAT (2007) v Purchased in bookshops Index Purchased books over the resident population Il Sole 24 Ore (2004) w Source: Nifo and Vecchione (2014) Note: a 'Indicatori territoriali per le politiche di sviluppo' (2004). b 'Relazione sull'attività svolta dalla gestione straordinaria dei Comuni commissariati' (1991-2005). c 'Atlante di competitività delle province italiane' (2001). d 'Atlante di competitività delle province italiane' ( 2001). e 'Relazione generale sulla situazione economica del Paese' (1997)(1998)(1999)(2000)(2001)(2002)(2003)(2004)). f 'Atlante di competitività delle province italiane' (2001). g 'Ecosistema Urbano 2004' ( 2004). h 'Atlante di competitività delle province italiane' (2001). i 'Indicatori statistici sulle amministrazioni centrali e locali' (2003) (http://dati.statistiche-pa.it/). j 'Atlante di competitività delle province italiane' ( 2008). k 'Atlante di competitività delle province italiane ' (2003-2004). l 'L'indice Confartigianato -Qualità della vita dell'impresa' (2009). m 'Indicatori territoriali per le politiche di sviluppo' (2003). n 'Indicatori territoriali per le politiche di sviluppo' (2003). o 'Data-base on Crime and Deterrence in the Italian Regions ' (1970-1999). p 'Graduatoria rispetto agli esauriti per magistrato presente ' (2004-2008). q 'Le misure dell'economia sommersa secondo le statistiche ufficiali' (2003). r 'Analisi dell'evasione fondata su dati IRAP, Anni 1998-2002' (2006. s 'Le cooperative sociali in Italia' (2006). t 'Le organizzazioni di volontariato in Italia' (2005). u 'Archivio storico delle elezioni' (http://elezionistorico.interno.it). v 'La produzione libraia' (2007). w 'Dossier sulla qualità della vita ' (2004).
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.