DISTORTED FACE PERCEPTION:AN ERP STUDY OF EMOTIONAL EXPRESSION PROCESSING

Abstract

Background. Reading the emotional cues from the faces of people around us is considered to be the crucial element of successful social interaction. However, at the moment there is no single point of view on the basic principles of the organization of neuromechanisms corresponding to face perception, which determines the relevance of this work. Therefore, we focused primarily on the effective neuronal networks formed during the processing of emotional visual stimuli – human faces, in their natural form and under the conditions of configurational changes‘ introduction. Current study aimed at highlighting more subtle elements of face perception and decoding mechanisms. Methods. For the purpose of the study, blurred facial expressions were presented amongst the natural face images of different emotional valence. During the exposition, the electroencephalogram was recorded, which then formed the basis for eventrelated potentials' grand average calculation. Further analysis involved comparing the grand average ERP curves recorded from the precentral cortical regions in two gender-based groups. The findings showed that female participants were more engaged in detecting and deciphering emotional expressions even from the minute hints included in the blurred photos. On the other hand, the male group also showed more significant decoding and recall processes, when presented with blurred neutral stimuli. Results. The findings showed that female participants were more engaged in detecting and deciphering emotional expressions even from the minute hints included in the blurred photos. On the other hand, the male group also showed more significant decoding and recall processes, when presented with blurred neutral stimuli. Conclusions. These results are consistent with current evidence on the emotional sensitivity hypothesis and genderspecific variations in face perception strategies, which reveal that men and women appear to perceive neutral faces with varying degrees of accuracy, and women are more likely to perform better when processing emotional expressions.