Skin conductance reveals the early development of the unconscious processing of emotions

Nava, Elena; Romano, Daniele; Grassi, Massimo; Turati, Chiara

doi:10.1016/j.cortex.2016.07.011

Cited by 30 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 29 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Emotional expressions displayed by both adults and peers were found to elicit autonomic arousal indicative of emotional responsivity in infants. In particular, changes in skin conductance and pupil diameter have been reported in response to expressions of happiness, fear, anger, and general distress in infants starting with the age of 4-months 96 – 99 . Changes in autonomic arousal also seem to be significantly related to infants’ facial responses in emotion elicitation situations 100 – 103 .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The development of spontaneous facial responses to others’ emotions in infancy: An EMG study

Kaiser

Crespo-Llado

Turati

et al. 2017

Sci Rep

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Viewing facial expressions often evokes facial responses in the observer. These spontaneous facial reactions (SFRs) are believed to play an important role for social interactions. However, their developmental trajectory and the underlying neurocognitive mechanisms are still little understood. In the current study, 4- and 7-month old infants were presented with facial expressions of happiness, anger, and fear. Electromyography (EMG) was used to measure activation in muscles relevant for forming these expressions: zygomaticus major (smiling), corrugator supercilii (frowning), and frontalis (forehead raising). The results indicated no selective activation of the facial muscles for the expressions in 4-month-old infants. For 7-month-old infants, evidence for selective facial reactions was found especially for happy (leading to increased zygomaticus major activation) and fearful faces (leading to increased frontalis activation), while angry faces did not show a clear differential response. These results suggest that emotional SFRs may be the result of complex neurocognitive mechanisms which lead to partial mimicry but are also likely to be influenced by evaluative processes. Such mechanisms seem to undergo important developments at least until the second half of the first year of life.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The development of spontaneous facial responses to others’ emotions in infancy: An EMG study

Kaiser

Crespo-Llado

Turati

et al. 2017

Sci Rep

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The authors interpreted these findings as evidence that infants younger than 12 months do not detect the threat conveyed by a static image of an angry face, and allocate more attentional resources to more familiar happy faces. Nonetheless, in contrast to this evidence, a recent study measuring skin conductance response showed that, already at the age of 3–4 months, the autonomic nervous system reacts with higher arousal in response to the subliminal and supraliminal presentation of angry faces compared to happy faces (Nava, Romano, Grassi, & Turati, ). These findings are taken as supporting the involvement of a subcortical pathway in detection of threatening stimuli, which is recruited early in life, well before the time—that is, 7 months—when infants first show behavioral evidence of discriminating between angry and happy facial expressions.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 85%

Emotion in motion: Facial dynamics affect infants' neural processing of emotions

Quadrelli

Conte

Cassia

et al. 2019

Developmental Psychobiology

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Research investigating the early development of emotional processing has focused mainly on infants' perception of static facial emotional expressions, likely restricting the amount and type of information available to infants. In particular, the question of whether dynamic information in emotional facial expressions modulates infants' neural responses has been rarely investigated. The present study aimed to fill this gap by recording 7‐month‐olds' event‐related potentials to static (Study 1) and dynamic (Study 2) happy, angry, and neutral faces. In Study 1, happy faces evoked a faster right‐lateralized negative central (Nc) component compared to angry faces. In Study 2, both happy and angry faces elicited a larger right‐lateralized Nc compared to neutral faces. Irrespective of stimulus dynamicity, a larger P400 to angry faces was associated with higher scores on the Negative Affect temperamental dimension. Overall, results suggest that 7‐month‐olds are sensitive to facial dynamics, which might play a role in shaping the neural processing of facial emotional expressions. Results also suggest that the amount of attentional resources infants allocate to angry expressions is associated to their temperamental traits. These findings represent a promising avenue for future studies exploring the neurobiological processes involved in perceiving emotional expressions using dynamic stimuli.

show abstract

“…A previous study has shown that skin conductance response (SCR) changes measured immediately following emotional fluctuation [24] and demonstrated that SCR could be considered an index to measure emotional change [24,25]. A previous study observed higher SCR reactivity in anxious people than those without anxiety [26].…”

Section: Symptoms or Behaviorsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Effect of Age, Gender, and Job on Skin Conductance Response among Smartphone Users Who are Prohibited from Using Their Smartphone

Hsieh

Hsu

Lin

et al. 2020

IJERPH

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The smartphone is a widely used and rapidly growing phenomenon worldwide, and problematic smartphone use is common in our society. This study’s objective was to examine the gender difference of baseline and post-intervention skin conductance response (SCR) among smartphone users and explore the relationships among problematic smartphone use level, anxiety level, and SCR changes by evaluating SCR, the Zung Self-Rating Anxiety Scale score, and the Chinese version of the Smartphone Addiction Inventory (SPAI) score in a one-group baseline and post-test design. Sixty participants were recruited from two communities, and data were collected from April to June 2017. There was a significant difference in terms of SCR changes between young males and old males and between young females and old females. Additionally, the SCR changes in young females were significantly greater than those in young males with twofold mean difference. This study provides strong evidence supporting the effectiveness of SCR measurement for assessing problematic smartphone use (PSU) anxiety when users are in a withdrawal-like state. The SCR measurement can help healthcare providers identify cases with risk factors of PSU for early intervention.

show abstract

Skin conductance reveals the early development of the unconscious processing of emotions

Cited by 30 publications

References 29 publications

The development of spontaneous facial responses to others’ emotions in infancy: An EMG study

The development of spontaneous facial responses to others’ emotions in infancy: An EMG study

Emotion in motion: Facial dynamics affect infants' neural processing of emotions

The Effect of Age, Gender, and Job on Skin Conductance Response among Smartphone Users Who are Prohibited from Using Their Smartphone

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About