Alexithymic traits impact the perception of implied motion in facial displays of affect.

Abstract

Something akin to motion perception occurs even when actual motion is not present but merely implied. However, it is not known if the experience of implied motion occurs during the perception of faces or even different affects. Moreover, it is not known if implied motion is moderated by individual differences in anxiety, depression or alexithymia. To examine this, participants were presented with picture pairs showing facial affect that implied either a forward or backward motion, i.e., depicting an increasing intensity in affect, or its diminution. Participants indicated whether or not the second face in the pair was the same as, or different from, the first face shown. To measure general affect recognition ability the Ekman 60 faces test was administered, as were the Toronto Alexithymia scale (TAS-20) and the Hospital Anxiety and Depression scale (HADS). Analysis of error rates revealed significant main effects for direction and emotion. There was no significant correlation with overall HADS score for any of the six emotions; there was also no effect of depression, anxiety or general face recognition abilities. Interestingly, the number of errors in the forward condition was negatively related to scores on the difficulty identifying feelings subscale of the TAS-20, which suggests that individuals who have problems identifying their own and others’ feelings had experienced a reduction in the experience of implied motion. Results suggest that implied motion may influence the experience of affect recognition and can be applied to clinical groups, specifically those demonstrating deficits in correctly recognising salient social cues.