Expression Influences the Recognition of Familiar Faces

Kaufmann, Jürgen M.; Schweinberger, Stefan R.

doi:10.1068/p5083

Cited by 121 publications

(122 citation statements)

References 39 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

102

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Yet, several studies reported faster categorization of happy faces than expressions of anger (Billings et al, 1993;Harrison et al, 1990;Hugdahl et al, 1993;Kaufmann and Schweinberger, 2004;Leppänen et al, 2003), disgust (Leppänen et al, 2003;Stalans and Wedding, 1985), sadness (Kirita and Endo, 1995;Stanners et al, 1985), or emotionally neutral faces (Hugdahl et al, 1993;Schweinberger et al, 2003). The con flicting findings may be due to different task designs: whereas visual search paradigms show faster detection of threatening stimuli, emotion recognition tasks involving a choice reaction time task report an advantage for happy faces.…”

Section: 5mentioning

confidence: 58%

Psychophysiological correlates of face processing in social phobia

2006

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Social phobia has been associated with abnormal processing of angry faces, which directly signal disapproval a situation that social phobics fear. This study investigated the electrophysiological correlates of emotional face processing in socially phobic and non phobic individuals. Subjects identified either the gender (modified emotional Stroop task) or the expression of angry, happy, or neutral faces. Social phobics showed no deviations from controls in reaction times, heart rates, P1, or P2 amplitudes in response to angry faces, although elevated FSS scores were associated with higher P1 amplitudes in social phobic persons. In addition, social phobic persons showed enhanced right temporo parietal N170 amplitudes in response to angry faces in the emotion identification task. Furthermore, higher scores on the Social Phobia and Anxiety Inventory (SPAI) were associated as a trend with larger N170 amplitudes in response to angry faces in the emotion identification task.Thus, the present results suggest that social phobics show abnormalities in the early visual processing of angry faces, as reflected by the enhanced right hemispheric N170 when the emotion of the angry face was the focus of attention, while behavioral responses and heart rates showed no evidence for preferred processing of angry facial expressions.

show abstract

Section: 5mentioning

confidence: 58%

Psychophysiological correlates of face processing in social phobia

2006

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Similarly, the RT data in Experiment 2 tentatively indicated a larger expression effect for famous than for unfamiliar faces. Also, present accuracy and N170 amplitude data (see the Expression Processing and Face Perception Models section) point toward identity-dependent expression analysis of famous faces, consistent with evidence indicating that facial representations are stored with preserved information of the facial expression with which the face is mainly experienced (e.g., Baudouin, Gilibert, Sansone, & Tiberghien, 2000;Kaufmann & Schweinberger, 2004). It is for future work, however, to more specifically examine the interaction of facial identity and expression processing in order to elaborate parallel-dependent face perception models.…”

Section: Temporal Organization Of Facial Familiarity and Expression Amentioning

confidence: 59%

On the temporal organization of facial identity and expression analysis: Inferences from event-related brain potentials

Martens

Leuthold

Schweinberger³

2010

Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Theoretical BackgroundBruce and classical model of face recognition assumes parallel processing of facial identity and expression within functionally independent processing pathways. According to this model, faces are initially processed at a common stage of structural encoding, after which processing bifurcates into the analysis of different aspects of the face, such as facial identity, expression, and speech. The facial identity pathway is assumed to rely on viewpoint-and expression-independent descriptions of faces that are stored in face recognition units (FRUs), which contain the structural codes of familiar faces. In the functionally independent expression pathway, processing of facial expression occurs in parallel with that within the identity pathway. The assumption of independent identity and expression pathways has received support from behavioral, neurophysiological, and brain-imaging studies (e.g., Bruce, 1986;Bruce & Young, 1986;Ellis, Young, & Flude, 1990;Hasselmo, Rolls, & Baylis, 1989;Sergent, Ohta, Macdonald, & Zuck, 1994;Tranel, Damasio, & Damasio, 1988;Young, McWeeny, Hay, & Ellis, 1986;Young, Newcombe, & Haan, 1993). However, as we will outline in more detail below, more recent face perception studies have challenged, on various grounds, this assumption of parallel and independent processing pathways (see Calder & Young, 2005;Martens, Leuthold, & Schweinberger, 2010). The present psychophysiological study further investigates this issue by examining the influence of task-related and stimulus-related factors on the processing of facial identity and expression.Doubts about the parallel model of face perception and its assumption of independent identity and expression processing have originated from behavioral face perception studies using the Garner interference task (see Garner, 1976). In these studies, participants typically fail to ignore irrelevant variations in the identity or gender of faces when processing facial expression, but not vice versa (e.g., Atkinson, Tipples, Burt, & Young, 2005;Baudouin, Martin, Tiberghien, Verlut, & Franck, 2002; Schwein berger & Soukup, 1998). Schweinberger, Burton, and Kelly (1999) examined whether differences in the relative processing speed of the two face dimensions were responsible for this asymmetric Garner interference effect (see also Atkinson et al., 2005;Ganel & Goshen-Gottstein, 2004). To this end, they manipulated the time demands for facial identity and expression analysis, using faces that were morphed along happy-sad and familiar-unfamiliar dimensions. Critically, reaction time (RT) performance in the expression classification task was impeded by irrelevant variations in facial identity even for stimulus 505© 2010 The Psychonomic Society, Inc.On the temporal organization of facial identity and expression analysis: Inferences from event-related brain potentials ULLA MARTENSUniversity of Osnabrück, Osnabrück, Germany HARTMUT LEUTHOLDUniversity of Glasgow, Glasgow, Scotland AND STEFAN R. SCHWEINBERGER University of Jena, Jena, GermanyIn the pre...

show abstract

“…In addition to equation on basic dimensions such as contrast and mean luminance, the consistent neutral expression of our faces ruled out emotion as an aid to recognition memory. Given emotional expression's known role in recognition (e.g., Gallegos & Tranel, 2005;Johansson, Mecklinger, & Treese, 2004;Kaufmann & Schweinberger, 2004), it is worth noting that systematic variation in the position and/or orientation of eyes, mouth, and brows (Ekman & Friesen, 1975) can generate Wilson faces that express distinct, easily identified emotions, and in varying degree (e.g., Isaacowitz et al, 2006). We plan to evaluate how the presence of emotion signals of varying, calibrated strength might combine with other facial information to influence short-term face recognition.…”

Section: Differences From Compound Gratingsmentioning

confidence: 99%