Judgments of facial expressions of emotion predicted from facial behavior

Abstract

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.