Emotion recognition in evolving facial expressions: A matter of believing

• Published in: Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience Vol. 16; p. 951974
• Main Authors: Sonnberger, Michael, Widmann, Carola, Potthoff, Denise, Seitz, Rüdiger J., Kleiser, Raimund
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland Frontiers Research Foundation 11.01.2023; Frontiers Media S.A
• Subjects: Anger; Basal ganglia; Behavioral Neuroscience; beliefs; emotion; Emotions; Empathy; face expression; fMRI; Happiness; Magnetic resonance imaging; Muscles; Pattern recognition; Thalamus; empathy; fMRI; face expression; emotion; beliefs
• ISSN: 1662-5153; 1662-5153
• DOI: 10.3389/fnbeh.2022.951974

Importantly, however, the observing subject believes that she/he has recognized the facial expression of the other person and trust this belief (Brashier and Marsh, 2020). [...]upon recognition of the emotion in the facial expression of the other person, the facial muscles of the observing subject change in a corresponding fashion. [...]believing has an immediate impact on the expressive behavior of the believing subject (Seitz et al., 2022). Here, we requested healthy subjects to recognize the emotions in facial expressions that were displayed to them in video clips. Because we were interested in determining when the subjects believed to have recognized the emotions, we used video clips in which the emotional face expressions evolved within 20 s out of a neutral face. [...]strong activity was found also in subcortical structures such as the basal ganglia and the thalamus as a part of a highly developed cortico-subcortical relay circuitry, supporting these functions (DeLong et al., 1984).