Abstract
Facial mimicry is a ubiquitous social behaviour modulated by a range of social cues, including those related to reward value and self-relevance. However, previous research has typically focused on a single moderator at a time, and it remains unknown how moderators interact when studied together. We compared the influence of reward value and self-relevance, by conditioning participants to associate certain faces with winning or losing money for themselves, or, with winning or losing money for another person. After conditioning, participants watched videos of these faces making happy and angry facial expressions whilst we recorded facial electromyographic activity. We found greater smile mimicry (activation of the Zygomaticus Major muscle) in response to happy expressions performed by faces associated with participants' own outcomes vs. faces associated with another person's outcomes. In contrast to previous research, whether a face was associated with winning or losing money did not modulate facial mimicry responses. These results, although preliminary, suggest that when faces are associated with both self-relevance and reward value, self-relevance could supersede the impact of reward value during facial mimicry.
Highlights
Self-relevance acts as an “integrative glue” whereby perception, memory and decision-making are enhanced for stimuli related to the self, compared to stimuli related to others
We focused our hypotheses on activation of the Zygomaticus Major (ZM) to happy ex pressions, given the reliable reward effects seen for smile mimicry in previous studies (Korb et al, 2019; Sims et al, 2012; Sims et al, 2014)
We compared the impact of self-relevance and reward value on facial mimicry responses to estimate their independent and combined effects
Summary
Self-relevance acts as an “integrative glue” whereby perception, memory and decision-making are enhanced for stimuli related to the self, compared to stimuli related to others (see Sui & Humphreys, 2015 for a review). There is evi dence to suggest that both self-relevance and reward effects can impact mimicry responses. Facial mimicry is greater towards more rewarding faces (Hofman et al, 2012; Korb et al, 2019; Sims et al, 2012) and in-group members (de Klerk et al, 2019; van der Schalk et al, 2011; Blocker & McIntosh, 2016; but see Sachisthal et al, 2016). The current study aimed to compare the influence of self-relevance and reward value on facial mimicry responses
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