Face Expression and Emotion

Question 1

Ekman’s neuro-cultural basic emotion theory

Answer 1

There are a limited set of basic emotions
These emotions are universal and innate
A categorical theory
Emotions adapted to provide efficient solutions to fundamental human life tasks (thriving, avoiding danger, passing on genes)
Each basic emotion has its own neural affect/emotional program hardwired within the brain
– couldn’t use fMRI to measure neuro but made assumption based on biological nature

Question 2

What is a basic emotion?

Answer 2

Basic emotions are automatic, involuntary, instincts/reflexes

Question 3

How do we measure basic emotions?

Answer 3

Bodily functions (face expression, physiological changes like heart rate, attentional vigilance)
Subjective feeling states

Question 4

Characteristics of basic emotions

Answer 4

Distinctive universal signals
Presence in other primates
Distinctive physiology
Distinctive universals in entecedent events
Coherence among emotional response
Quick onset
Brief duration
Automatic appraisal
Unbidden occurence

Question 5

6 basic emotions?

Answer 5

Happiness
Fear
Anger
Disgust
Surprise
Sadness

– Prototypical face expressions for each of the basic emotions

Question 6

Cultural part of neuro-cultural BET?

Answer 6

Culture can influence the stimuli that trigger emotions programmes - but the affect programmes are still the same

Adaptive value - cognitive resources should be reserved for what matters to us

Question 7

What are display rules?

Answer 7

Display rules are conventions, norms and habits that develop regarding the management of emotional responses.

While we have the same physiological responses to feeling a basic emotion, we can voluntarily tamper/amplify our reactions and the extent to which we show the emotion, e.g. inhibit automatic AUs through deliberate regulation

Question 8

Display rules in Japanese and Americans - Ekman, 1972

Answer 8

Observed am. and jap. students watching surgical film clips - in ‘private’ and in front of researcher
Private - would lessen display rules as there is no cultural expectation/norm to adhere to in private
– had the same expressions in private
In presence
– Japenese displayed more positive expressions - display rules neutralised negative expressions

Question 9

Predictions of BET?

Answer 9

Should be found in all cultures with the same distinct physiological profile and facial expression
Evolutionary precursors in other mammals
Coherence between various components - bodily actions and physiological changes (e.g. increased heart rate should prepare to act)
In the absence of display rules, facial expressions should tightly correlate with distinct subjective feeling states

Question 10

Spontaneous facial expressions and emotion - Ekman, 1980

Answer 10

Spontaneous expressions should inform about the intensity and quality of emotional experience
Mostly female ppts watched 3 positive films and 1 negative film
Measured spontaneous facial expressions using FACS
Used self-report to measure emotional experience (subjective experience)

Those who showed one missing AU were experiencing less intense happiness

BUT this experiment may be easy to guess aim of - explicit diffs in videos

Question 11

What is the facial action coding system (FACS)?

Answer 11

Anatomy based system for measuring visible facial behaviour
44 action units that correspond to basic facial actions
One basic emotion is associated with all AUs of the emotion being activated to be considered genuine

Question 12

Coherence of emotional experience and facial expressions - Bonanno and Keltner, 2004

Answer 12

Bereaved individuals filmed while talking about the recent death of their spouse
- real world, highly salient emotions – eco. validity
Coded spontaneous emotions using action units
Thematic analysis of speech themes (pride, happiness, sadness)
Self-report of ppts experience
Most themes were highly coherent with appropriate AUs and corresponding self reported experiences, e.g. more sad AUs when talking about loss, anger with anger AUs
Some expressions might regulate difficult emotions, e.g. smiling AUs when talking about injustice

Question 13

Emotional experiences not predicting expressions - Duran et al.

Answer 13

Meta-analysis of how often and reliably predicted facial expression co-occurs with the experience of a basic emotion
Correlation was not significant, even after making requirements less stringent
Co-occurance was also highly variable depending on the emotion

– the face may not automatically show what we feel

– if emotions have social functions, perhaps culture is more strongly shaping as we have to communicate to others

Question 14

What is constructed emotion theory?

Answer 14

Emotion is not categorical but dimensional
A psychological event that we construct in our brains from stimuli in the world around us and in our bodies
Emotions are constuctions of the world not reactions to it
We construct emotions according to core affect (our internal experience) and the environment (what is happening around us)

Question 15

What is core affect?

Answer 15

An ongoing, ever-changing psychological state
Consists of varying levels of valence (positive/negative) and arousal (high/low)
Core affect is different between all people - fear can look slightly different in each person

Question 16

Context Effect and ambiguity

Answer 16

The same face on different body and different environmental contexts causes us to perceive emotions differently
We interpret based on multiple cues - not just the facial expression of emotion that causes

• supports constructed emotion - if it was fully innate we would recognise the emotion regardless of the world around it - we construct emotion partly from context

Question 17

Language making an emotional categorical

Answer 17

Ppts said the word anger until it lost all meaning (habituation) and temporarily blocked the concept of the word
After, ppts failed to perceive the emotion properly or in the same manner as before (much slower)

– supports constructed emotion - we construct it partly from our language - not a core part of our innate biology

– as language is categorical, this may make emotions appear the same as we construct them within the parameters of language

Question 18

Emotion progression over child development

Answer 18

Followed children from 30 months to 12 years
Looked at faces when they were telling stories and asked to label the emotions
Youngest infants labelled all emotions as either positive or negative (valence?)
– younger children also only experience negative or positively valenced emotions, e.g. anger and sadness show very similar expressions in young infants, difference by toddlerhood
Toddlers begin to sophisticate understanding to slowly add more over time
Only older children can then recognise disgust
– maybe because a lot of what we find disgusting is culturally and contextually defined - young children do not generally have a strong concept of disgust like adults
Constructs become more complex with age and experience of the world

BUT this could be invalid due to children not being able to verbalise - perhaps the internal working model of the emotion is the same but we need to adjust our methods to better reflect this? could be limited in construct validity and there may be generous heterotypic continuity

Question 19

What is NEW basic emotions theory? (social functionalism)

Answer 19

Increasing focus on the social functions of emotion and how this relates to basic emotion
Two main assumptions:
1) distinct emotions enable humans to meet the challenges and opportunities of cooperative social living
2) emotional expressions coordinate behaviour within social interactions, e.g. if everyone’s happy and coordinated more likely to succeed in making something
- allow us to convey our internal state and information to others

Not based on simply prototypical expressions of the 6 emotions
Considers a dynamic multimodal expressions
Categories overlap and are dynamic - often blended and shaped by culture and context