Neural activation during the processing of ambiguous fearful facial expressions: An ERP study in anxious and nonanxious individuals

Frenkel, Tahl I.; Bar‐Haim, Yair

doi:10.1016/j.biopsycho.2011.08.001

Cited by 45 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 53 publications

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“…In light of these results, it may not be as surprising that individuals with FXS, a genetic risk for anxiety, would show hypoactivation of the amygdala and would not necessarily mimic a typically developing population of individuals with anxiety. Furthermore, Frenkel and colleagues (2011) have demonstrated blunted EEG responses to fearful faces in individuals with anxiety, contradicting the classical view of anxiety as an internal state of hypervigilance and hyperarousal and instead depicting it as a state of blunted responsiveness (Frenkel and Bar-Haim 2011). Thus the reduced amygdalar activation seen among individuals with FXS may represent a significant blunting of social responsiveness that impairs processing of emotional faces and renders social interactions more ambiguous, contributing to social anxiety in this population.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 87%

Emotion Potentiated Startle in Fragile X Syndrome

Ballinger

Cordeiro

Chavez

et al. 2014

J Autism Dev Disord

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Social avoidance and anxiety are prevalent in fragile X syndrome (FXS) and are potentially mediated by the amygdala, a brain region critical for social behavior. Unfortunately, fMRI investigation of the amygdala in FXS is limited by the difficulties experienced by intellectually impaired and anxious participants. We investigated the relationship between social avoidance and emotion-potentiated startle, a probe of amygdala activation, in children and adolescents with FXS, developmental disability without FXS (DD), and typical development. Individuals with FXS or DD demonstrated significantly reduced potentiation to fearful faces than a typically developing control group (p<.05). However, among individuals with FXS, social avoidance correlated positively with fearful-face potentiation (p<.05). This suggests that general intellectual disability blunts amygdalar response, but differential amygdala responsiveness to social stimuli contributes to phenotypic variability among individuals with FXS.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 87%

Emotion Potentiated Startle in Fragile X Syndrome

Ballinger

Cordeiro

Chavez

et al. 2014

J Autism Dev Disord

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“…The current results thus suggest a diminished differential attentional processing of emotional in comparison to neutral stimuli in persons with relatively enhanced right frontal activation. Interestingly, previous research demonstrated that diminished ΔLPP scores are associated with anxiety (Frenkel & Bar‐Haim, ; Holmes, Nielsen, & Green, ; Mühlberger et al, ; Weinberg & Hajcak, ) and depression (Kayser, Bruder, Tenke, Stewart, & Quitkin, ; MacNamara, Kotov, & Hajcak, ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The influence of frontal alpha‐asymmetry on the processing of approach‐ and withdrawal‐related stimuli—A multichannel psychophysiology study

et al. 2017

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The approach-withdrawal model of hemispheric activation suggests that left frontal cortical areas mediate approach, while right frontal cortical areas mediate withdrawal motivation. Within this framework, the present study investigates the association of frontal cortical asymmetry with attentional and emotional responses toward approach- and withdrawal-related emotional stimuli. Resting frontal asymmetry was measured from 43 students before they passively viewed negative, neutral, and positive emotional pictures. The startle reflex, skin conductance response, and subjective ratings of valence and arousal were assessed to quantify emotional responding, while attention was assessed with ERPs. We also assessed frontal asymmetry in response to the pictures. Results indicated that relatively stronger right frontal cortical activation was associated with increased N1 amplitudes and more negative subjective emotional evaluation of all stimuli. Furthermore, enhanced right frontal asymmetry (state and trait) was associated with diminished emotional modulation of the late positive potential. In contrast, no association of frontal asymmetry with defensive reflex physiology or activation of sympathetic nervous system activity was found. The current data suggest dissociable influence of resting frontal brain asymmetry on attentional and physiological processing of withdrawal- and approach-related stimuli. That is, asymmetrical frontal cortical brain activation might not modulate approach-/withdrawal-related motor responses and sympathetic arousal directly, but instead enhances allocation of attentional resources to subjectively significant stimuli. The results are discussed in terms of their potential importance for emotion perception in anxiety disorders and their contribution to the understanding of frontal asymmetry.

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“…The late positive potential ERP component, the LPP, appears 400-800 ms poststimulus onset and reflects more complex processes associated with memory, categorization, and evaluation of the affective and motivational significance of the stimulus for the perceiver (Friedman & Johnson, 2000;Frenkel & Bar-Haim, 2011;Schacht & Sommer, 2009;Sun et al, 2017). Critically, previous work has distinguished the timing and presumed brain sources of different psychological processes generating distinct types of LPP response.…”

Section: Erp Measures Of Face Processingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ambiguous at the second sight: Mixed facial expressions trigger late electrophysiological responses linked to lower social impressions

Kamińska

Magnuski

Olszanowski

et al. 2020

Cogn Affect Behav Neurosci

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Social interactions require quick perception, interpretation, and categorization of faces, with facial features offering cues to emotions, intentions, and traits. Importantly, reactions to faces depend not only on their features but also on their processing fluency, with disfluent faces suffering social devaluation. The current research used electrophysiological (EEG) and behavioral measures to explore at what processing stage and under what conditions emotional ambiguity is detected in the brain and how it influences trustworthiness judgments. Participants viewed male and female faces ranging from pure anger, through mixed expressions, to pure happiness. They categorized each face along the experimental dimension (happy vs. angry) or a control dimension (gender). In the emotion-categorization condition, mixed (ambiguous) expressions were classified relatively slower, and their trustworthiness was rated relatively lower. EEG analyses revealed that early brain responses are independent of the categorization condition, with pure faces evoking larger P1/N1 responses than mixed expressions. Some late (728-880 ms) brain responses from central-parietal sites also were independent of the categorization condition and presumably reflect familiarity of the emotion categories, with pure expressions evoking larger central-parietal LPP amplitude than mixed expressions. Interestingly, other late responses were sensitive to both expressive features and categorization task, with ambiguous faces evoking a larger LPP amplitude in frontal-medial sites around 560-660 ms but only in the emotion categorization task. Critically, these late responses from the frontal-medial cluster correlated with the reduction in trustworthiness judgments. Overall, the results suggest that ambiguity detection involves late, top-down processes and that it influences important social impressions.

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Neural activation during the processing of ambiguous fearful facial expressions: An ERP study in anxious and nonanxious individuals

Cited by 45 publications

References 53 publications

Emotion Potentiated Startle in Fragile X Syndrome

Emotion Potentiated Startle in Fragile X Syndrome

The influence of frontal alpha‐asymmetry on the processing of approach‐ and withdrawal‐related stimuli—A multichannel psychophysiology study

Ambiguous at the second sight: Mixed facial expressions trigger late electrophysiological responses linked to lower social impressions

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