The use of visual information in the recognition of posed and spontaneous facial expressions

Saumure, Camille; Plouffe-Demers, Marie-Pier; Estéphan, Amanda; Fiset, Daniel; Blais, Caroline

doi:10.1167/18.9.21

Cited by 9 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 61 publications

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“…Our finding of reduced perceived intensity of intended emotions for masked faces is in line with previous studies showing negative effects of mask-wearing on emotion categorisation accuracy [ 23 , 24 , 27 , 28 ], and underscores the importance of the mouth region for emotion recognition [ 14 , 15 , 20 , 22 ]. However, angry expressions were an exception to this pattern: We found that mask-wearing had no effect on the perceived intensity of the target emotion.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

How does the presence of a surgical face mask impair the perceived intensity of facial emotions?

et al. 2022

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The use of surgical-type face masks has become increasingly common during the COVID-19 pandemic. Recent findings suggest that it is harder to categorise the facial expressions of masked faces, than of unmasked faces. To date, studies of the effects of mask-wearing on emotion recognition have used categorisation paradigms: authors have presented facial expression stimuli and examined participants’ ability to attach the correct label (e.g., happiness, disgust). While the ability to categorise particular expressions is important, this approach overlooks the fact that expression intensity is also informative during social interaction. For example, when predicting an interactant’s future behaviour, it is useful to know whether they are slightly fearful or terrified, contented or very happy, slightly annoyed or angry. Moreover, because categorisation paradigms force observers to pick a single label to describe their percept, any additional dimensionality within observers’ interpretation is lost. In the present study, we adopted a complementary emotion-intensity rating paradigm to study the effects of mask-wearing on expression interpretation. In an online experiment with 120 participants (82 female), we investigated how the presence of face masks affects the perceived emotional profile of prototypical expressions of happiness, sadness, anger, fear, disgust, and surprise. For each of these facial expressions, we measured the perceived intensity of all six emotions. We found that the perceived intensity of intended emotions (i.e., the emotion that the actor intended to convey) was reduced by the presence of a mask for all expressions except for anger. Additionally, when viewing all expressions except surprise, masks increased the perceived intensity of non-intended emotions (i.e., emotions that the actor did not intend to convey). Intensity ratings were unaffected by presentation duration (500ms vs 3000ms), or attitudes towards mask wearing. These findings shed light on the ambiguity that arises when interpreting the facial expressions of masked faces.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

How does the presence of a surgical face mask impair the perceived intensity of facial emotions?

et al. 2022

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“…One could argue that the latter are more ecologically valid and could potentially lead to different results than those obtained in the present study. Interestingly, a group of researchers 56 has shown a high degree of similarity in visual strategies when posed and spontaneous facial expressions are compared. However, they do reveal that there is a higher degree of heterogeneity in the useful facial cues across identities in spontaneous expressions 56 .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Interestingly, a group of researchers 56 has shown a high degree of similarity in visual strategies when posed and spontaneous facial expressions are compared. However, they do reveal that there is a higher degree of heterogeneity in the useful facial cues across identities in spontaneous expressions 56 . This implies that different facial features could be more/less useful for different expressors.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The role of spatial frequencies for facial pain categorization

Charbonneau

Guérette

Cormier

et al. 2021

Sci Rep

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Studies on low-level visual information underlying pain categorization have led to inconsistent findings. Some show an advantage for low spatial frequency information (SFs) and others a preponderance of mid SFs. This study aims to clarify this gap in knowledge since these results have different theoretical and practical implications, such as how far away an observer can be in order to categorize pain. This study addresses this question by using two complementary methods: a data-driven method without a priori expectations about the most useful SFs for pain recognition and a more ecological method that simulates the distance of stimuli presentation. We reveal a broad range of important SFs for pain recognition starting from low to relatively high SFs and showed that performance is optimal in a short to medium distance (1.2–4.8 m) but declines significantly when mid SFs are no longer available. This study reconciles previous results that show an advantage of LSFs over HSFs when using arbitrary cutoffs, but above all reveal the prominent role of mid-SFs for pain recognition across two complementary experimental tasks.

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“…Interestingly, a group of researchers [49] has shown a high degree of similarity in visual strategies when posed and spontaneous facial expressions are compared. However, they do reveal that there is a higher degree of heterogeneity in the useful facial cues across identities in spontaneous expressions [49]. This implies that different facial features could be more/less useful for different expressors.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Role of Spatial Frequencies for Facial Pain Categorization

Charbonneau

Guérette

Cormier

et al. 2021

Preprint

Self Cite

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Studies on low-level visual information underlying pain categorization have led to inconsistent findings. Some are showing an advantage for low spatial frequency information (SFs) and others a preponderance of mid SFs. This study aims to clarify this gap in knowledge since these results have different theoretical and practical implications, such as how far away an observer can be in order to categorize pain. This study addresses this question by using two complementary methods: a data-driven method without a priori about the most useful SFs for pain recognition and a more ecological method that simulates the distance of stimuli presentation. We reveal a broad range of important SF for pain recognition starting from low to relatively high SFs and showed that performance is optimal in a short to medium distance (1.2 to 4.8 meters) but declines significantly when mid SFs are no longer available. This study reconciles previous results that show an advantage of LSFs over HSFs when using arbitrary cutoffs, but above all reveal the prominent role of mid-SFs for pain recognition across two experimental tasks.

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The use of visual information in the recognition of posed and spontaneous facial expressions

Cited by 9 publications

References 61 publications

How does the presence of a surgical face mask impair the perceived intensity of facial emotions?

How does the presence of a surgical face mask impair the perceived intensity of facial emotions?

The role of spatial frequencies for facial pain categorization

The Role of Spatial Frequencies for Facial Pain Categorization

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