Exploring Facial Expressions in Pietà and Nativity Paintings Throughout Time

The emotional expressions of social robots are increasingly important for improving human–robot interaction. However, few studies have explored the emotional expressions of robots in auditory and multimodal modalities within specific interaction contexts. Three experiments were conducted to investigate the impact of emotion categories and emotional intensity in robots’ facial and auditory expressions on user perception and visual behavior under unimodal and multimodal conditions. Results showed that: (1) in unimodal conditions, higher emotional intensity in facial expressions and voice led to higher perceived trustworthiness than low emotional intensity; (2) in multimodal conditions, positive emotion and higher emotional intensity in both modalities enhanced trustworthiness and likability; (3) visual behavior showed that the eye region attracted the most attention. Additionally, participants’ experience and gender significantly influenced visual behavior. This study offers insights into the impact of robots’ emotional expressions on user perception and visual behavior while providing important guidance for the design of empathetic robots.

Emotional monologues of brain-damaged subjects were examined to determine whether interhemispheric or intrahemispheric differences exist for facial emotional expression. A special feature was the comparison of expressions produced during the initial, middle, and last segments of the monologues. Videotaped emotional and non-emotional monologues from the New York Emotion Battery (Borod, Welkowitz, & Obler, 1992) of eight right brain-damaged (RBD), eight left brain-damaged (LBD), and eight normal control (NC) subjects, with matching for demographics and lesion location, were rated. Five raters were trained to evaluate the emotional intensity and category accuracy of the facial expressions produced during these monologues. Results revealed some support for a reversed valence effect, with RBDs showing relatively less accurate performance during positive monologues. Intrahemispheric results revealed that, overall, RBDs with frontal lobe lesions showed the least intense facial expressions. Segment analysis found that individuals produced facial expressions with significantly more emotional intensity during the middle and last thirds of the monologues than during the initial third of the monologues. Findings indicate intrahemispheric as well as interhemispheric differences in facial emotional expression and suggest the utilization of the latter parts of monologues in the evaluation of emotional expression, which has potential clinical implications.

An experiment was performed to assess whether Ekman and Friesen's Facial Action Coding System (FACS) could be used to construct facial expressions that portrayed with varying intensities each of the eight emotions of happiness, fear, disgust, sadness, surprise, shame, anger, and contempt. Based on detailed instructions from FACS, seven adults posed facial expressions that presumably varied in the conveyed emotion and emotion intensity. Thirty-nine college student observers then viewed each of the videotaped facial expressions. Ratings were made of whether each expression connoted one of the eight emotions or no emotion and of the intensity of the perceived emotion. Observers' emotion classification and intensity ratings agreed with FACS-based predictions regarding the facial action units involved in expressing each of the emotions. Most perceived-predicted emotion discrepancies could be accounted for by facial action units shared by the different emotions. Moreover, except for disgust, observers' intensity judgments reflected a reliance on only one or two action units for each emotion. These findings corroborate the descriptive and predictive utility of FACS for studies on perception of emotions.

Human facial expressions can be recognized rapidly and effortlessly. However, for intense emotions from real life, positive and negative facial expressions are difficult to discriminate and the judgment of facial expressions is biased towards simultaneously perceived body expressions. This study employed event-related potentials (ERPs) to investigate the neural dynamics involved in the integration of emotional signals from facial and body expressions of victory and defeat. Emotional expressions of professional players were used to create pictures of face-body compounds, with either matched or mismatched emotional expressions in faces and bodies. Behavioral results showed that congruent emotional information of face and body facilitated the recognition of facial expressions. ERP data revealed larger P1 amplitudes for incongruent compared to congruent stimuli. Also, a main effect of body valence on the P1 was observed, with enhanced amplitudes for the stimuli with losing compared to winning bodies. The main effect of body expression was also observed in N170 and N2, with winning bodies producing larger N170/N2 amplitudes. In the later stage, a significant interaction of congruence by body valence was found on the P3 component. Winning bodies elicited lager P3 amplitudes than losing bodies did when face and body conveyed congruent emotional signals. Beyond the knowledge based on prototypical facial and body expressions, the results of this study facilitate us to understand the complexity of emotion evaluation and categorization out of laboratory.

This study examined the relationship between facial expression and social functioning in schizophrenic, depressed, right-brain-damaged, Parkinson ' s disease, and normal adult participants. Raters evaluated general intensity and amount of positive and negative facial emotion while participants were producing monologues regarding pleasant and unpleasant experiences. Social functioning items were derived from three standardized inventories. Overall, patient groups displayed more negative and less positive emotion than normals, and the schizophrenic and right-brain-damaged groups showed less intense expressions than normals. Correlational analyses suggested that the more intense the facial expressions, the better the social functioning, and that the more negative emotion displayed, the poorer the social functioning.

Experience of emotions changes with age: older adults report fewer intense negative emotional experiences, and are less accurate in labelling facial expressions of some negative emotions. However, there is little empirical evidence as to the effect of age on perception of intensity of emotions. This study aims to investigate whether younger and older adults differ in their ratings of the intensity of others' emotions as presented in photographs of faces and descriptions in text. Age effects on intensity ratings of emotions (happiness, fear, anger, sadness) from photographs of facial expressions and verbal descriptions of emotions in text were investigated in 91 healthy adult participants. Relationships of these intensity ratings with measures of cognitive ability and current mood were also examined. Older participants perceived lower levels of emotional intensity in sad and happy faces. Compared with the older group, younger adults perceived neutral faces as showing high anger levels. Younger adults also rated protagonists in stories as experiencing high levels of fear. Most of the age differences could be statistically explained in terms of anxiety, depression, and intelligence test scores. Older adults rate some aspects of emotions portrayed in facial expressions and written text as less intense. This may partly reflect better emotional adjustment with age, as reflected in lower levels of anxiety and depression.

The prefrontal cortex plays a key role in emotional state. Electroencephalography (EEG) studies have reported relationships between frontal asymmetry in the alpha band, emotional state, and emotion-related motivation. The current study investigated whether the positive or negative valence of emotional stimulation or the behavioral intention to either facilitate or suppress one’s facial expression in response to these stimuli is reflected in relevant changes in frontal EEG asymmetry. EEG was recorded while participants either produced a facial expression that was in accord with positive or negative feelings corresponding to image stimuli, or suppressed their facial expressions. The laterality index of frontal alpha power indicated greater relative right frontal activity while participants suppressed facial expression compared with facilitating facial expression during emotional stimulation. However, there was no difference in frontal asymmetry between the presentation of image stimuli showing facial expressions corresponding to positive vs. negative emotions. These results suggested that frontal asymmetry was related to the control of facial emotional expressions rather than the perception of positive vs. negative emotions. Moreover, microstate analysis revealed that the appearance rate of microstate class B with polarity in the left frontal area increased during the suppression of facial expressions. The present results suggested that frontal asymmetry reflects the control of facial emotional expressions, which supports the motivational direction model.

This study examined the effects of mindfulness motor tasks on the emotional experience. We examined the intensity of positive, negative and ambiguous emotions in men and women. We also used a content analysis of the comments on the most intense emotions. 91 university students took part in the study. We used the questionnaire GES (Games and Emotion Scale) to register the intensity of thirteen basic positive, negative and ambiguous emotions. The quantitative data analysis was performed using a model based on generalized estimating equations (GEE), and the qualitative data were analyzed through the CHAID classification trees technique. The mindfulness motor tasks elicited intense positive emotions values, intermediate values of ambiguous emotions and the lowest values of negative emotions. Men reported more intense positive emotions than women. No significant differences were found in the other emotions. Comments on positive emotions were associated, in equal proportion to internal aspects of the motor tasks as external aspects. Negative and ambiguous emotions were mostly referred mostly to internal aspects of the mindfulness motor tasks. These findings confirm that mindfulness motor tasks are an appropriate pedagogical way to stimulate emotional awareness as socioemotional competence and they contribute to promote the personal well being. Hence it was considered appropriate on the emotional development in the field of physical education.

Mutual influences between message volume and emotion intensity on emerging infectious diseases: An investigation with microblog data

Nonverbal expressions of emotion can vary in intensity, from ambiguous to prototypical exemplars: for instance, facial displays of happiness may range from a faint smile to a full-blown grin. Previous work suggests that the accuracy with which facial expressions are recognized as the intended emotion increases with emotional intensity, although this pattern depends on the displayed emotion. Less is known about the association between emotional intensity and the recognition of vocal emotional expressions (affective prosody), which also convey information about others' socioemotional intent but are perceived and interpreted differently than facial expressions. The current study examined listeners' ability to recognize emotional intent in morphed vocal prosody recordings that varied in emotional intensity from neutral to prototypical exemplars of basic emotions (anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness) and social expressions (friendliness, meanness). Results suggest that listeners' accuracy in identifying the intended emotional intent in each recording increased nonlinearly with emotional intensity. This pattern varied by emotion type: for instance, accuracy for anger rose steeply with increasing emotional intensity before plateauing, whereas accuracy for happiness remained unchanged across low-intensity exemplars but increased thereafter. These findings highlight emotion-specific ways in which dynamic changes in emotional intensity inform perceptions of socioemotional intent in emotional prosody. Moreover, these results also point to potential challenges in emotional communication in social interactions that rely primarily on the voice, with many low-intensity expressions having a higher probability of being misinterpreted. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

The objectives of this study were to propose a method of presenting dynamic facial expressions to experimental subjects, in order to investigate human perception of avatar's facial expressions of different levels of emotional intensity. The investigation concerned how perception varies according to the strength of facial expression, as well as according to an avatar's gender. To accomplish these goals, we generated a male and a female virtual avatar with five levels of intensity of happiness and anger using a morphing technique. We then recruited 16 normal healthy subjects and measured each subject's emotional reaction by scoring affective arousal and valence after showing them the avatar's face. Through this study, we were able to investigate human perceptual characteristics evoked by male and female avatars' graduated facial expressions of happiness and anger. In addition, we were able to identify that a virtual avatar's facial expression could affect human emotion in different ways according to the avatar's gender and the intensity of its facial expressions. However, we could also see that virtual faces have some limitations because they are not real, so subjects recognized the expressions well, but were not influenced to the same extent. Although a virtual avatar has some limitations in conveying its emotion using facial expressions, this study is significant in that it shows that a new potential exists to use or manipulate emotional intensity by controlling a virtual avatar's facial expression linearly using a morphing technique. Therefore, it is predicted that this technique may be used for assessing emotional characteristics of humans, and may be of particular benefit for work with people with emotional disorders through a presentation of dynamic expression of various emotional intensities.

Objective Although emotion dysregulation is a transdiagnostic risk factor for psychopathology, research typically focuses on dysregulation of negative emotions only. We investigated the contributions of dimensions of emotional experience, emotion beliefs, and non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) to both negative and positive emotion dysregulation. Method 441 participants (M age = 23.65, 73.5% female, 39.0% with lifetime NSSI) reported their negative and positive emotion reactivity, intensity, perseveration, and dysregulation, as well as their NSSI history and beliefs about the controllability and usefulness of emotions. Results Emotion intensity, perseveration, uncontrollability beliefs, and NSSI were uniquely associated with emotion dysregulation. Counter to predictions, emotion reactivity was associated with less dysregulation. Greater perseveration was associated with greater dysregulation of both negative and positive emotions, but only for participants who believed emotions were uncontrollable. NSSI also moderated the associations between emotion experiences and dysregulation. Among individuals who self-injure, increased emotional intensity was associated with greater dysregulation of positive emotions. Among individuals who self-injure and believed emotions were more useful, increased reactivity was linked to less dysregulation of positive emotions. Conversely, for those without a NSSI history who believed emotions were less useful, increased reactivity was associated with less dysregulation of positive emotion. Conclusion Emotion beliefs are an important mechanism associated with dysregulation of both negative and positive emotion. Positive emotions play a complex role in dysregulation, influenced by cognitive (controllability and usefulness beliefs) and behavioral factors (NSSI), underscoring the need for future research to explore dysregulation of both negative and positive emotions to improve emotional well-being. Highlights Emotion experiences, beliefs, and NSSI are linked toand positive and negative emotion dysregulation. Extended emotions responses are linked to dysregulation only in the context of believing emotions areuncontrollable. Similar emotion beliefs relate differently to experiences and dysregulation depending on NSSI status.

BackgroundEmotional cognitive impairment is a core phenotype of the clinical symptoms of psychiatric disorders. The ability to measure emotional cognition is useful for assessing neurodegenerative conditions and treatment responses. However, certain factors such as culture, gender, and generation influence emotional recognition, and these differences require examination. We investigated the characteristics of healthy young Japanese adults with respect to facial expression recognition.MethodsWe generated 17 models of facial expressions for each of the six basic emotions (happiness, sadness, anger, fear, disgust, and surprise) at three levels of emotional intensity using the Facial Acting Coding System (FACS). Thirty healthy Japanese young adults evaluated the type of emotion and emotional intensity the models represented to them.ResultsAssessment accuracy for all emotions, except fear, exceeded 60% in approximately half of the videos. Most facial expressions of fear were rarely accurately recognized. Gender differences were observed with respect to both faces and participants, indicating that expressions on female faces were more recognizable than those on male faces, and female participants had more accurate perceptions of facial emotions than males.ConclusionThe videos used may constitute a dataset, with the possible exception of those that represent fear. The subject’s ability to recognize the type and intensity of emotions was affected by the gender of the portrayed face and the evaluator’s gender. These gender differences must be considered when developing a scale of facial expression recognition.

Edible insects are recognized as a potential alternative and sustainable source of high-quality protein for the human diet. Entomophagy is highly related to negative emotions that may cause reluctance to adopt insects as food in Western countries. During human interaction, a person's facial emotional expression (FEE) may influence other people's emotional responses. A person's emotional state may affect his/her food preference and food choice. Understanding how other people's FEE would affect consumers' emotional profiles, liking, and subsequent willingness to try (WTT) and purchase intent (PI) toward insect-containing food products may help increase the acceptance of entomophagy. This study identified emotional responses toward chocolate chip cookies containing cricket protein using valence and arousal scales in order to explore the effects of other people's FEE (positive, negative, and/or sensation seeking) and to find the correlation between consumers' emotional and overall liking (OL) responses for cricket-containing chocolate chip cookies. Predicting PI for such cookies was also performed. For consumers who perceived positive emotion from other people's FEE after watching a short video clip, their emotional feeling was raised on both valence and arousal dimensions, while negative FEE stimulus imparted the opposite effects. The OL scores and emotional intensities after watching the three FEE videos were highly related to consumers' PI. Males compared to females rated the cricket-containing cookies higher on positive emotion intensity, OL, and PI. Among the three FEEs evaluated, the positive emotional stimulus would be beneficial in increasing acceptance, WTT, and PI of insect-containing foods. PRACTICAL APPLICATION: Edible insects are potentially alternative and sustainable sources of high-quality protein for the human diet. Entomophagy is highly related to negative emotions that cause reluctance to adopt insects as food in Western countries. Other people's facial emotional expressions (FEEs) may affect consumer food-evoked emotional profiles, overall liking (OL), and purchase intent (PI). For consumers who perceived positive emotion from other people's FEE, their emotional feeling was raised on both valence and arousal dimensions, and OL scores and emotion intensities were highly related to consumers' PI. Exploiting positive emotional stimuli as demonstrated in this study would be beneficial in increasing acceptance of insect-containing food.

Offspring of depressed parents are at greatly increased risk for mood disorders. Among potential mechanisms of risk, recent studies have focused on information processing anomalies, such as attention and memory biases, in the offspring of depressed parents. In this study we examined another information processing domain, perceptual sensitivity to emotion cues in facial expressions, as a potential mechanism of risk that characterizes the offspring of depressed parents. The study included 64 children at familial-risk for depression and 40 low-risk peers between the ages 7 and 13(Mage = 9.51; SD = 2.27). Participants were presented with pictures of facial expressions that varied in emotional intensity from neutral to full-intensity sadness or anger (i.e., emotion recognition), or pictures of faces morphing from anger to sadness (emotion discrimination). After each picture was presented, children indicated whether the face showed a specific emotion (i.e., sadness, anger) or no emotion at all (neutral) using a forced choice paradigm. We examined group differences in the intensity of emotion that suggested greater sensitivity to specific emotions. In the emotion recognition task, boys (but not girls) at familial-risk for depression identified sadness at significantly lower levels of emotional intensity than did their low-risk peers. The high and low-risk groups did not differ with regard to identification of anger. In the emotion discrimination task, both groups displayed over-identification of sadness in ambiguous mixed faces but high-risk youth were less likely to show this labeling bias than their peers. Our findings are consistent with the hypothesis that enhanced perceptual sensitivity to subtle traces of sadness in facial expressions may be a potential mechanism of risk among boys at familial-risk for depression. This enhanced perceptual sensitivity does not appear to be due to biases in the labeling of ambiguous faces.