Automatic facial expression recognition without motor simulation
(2024) The Seeing and Acting Worskhop: Functional and Neural Perspectives — Location: Coimbra, Portugal (27.September.2024)
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- Abstract
- Efficient recognition of facial expressions is often assumed to require a covert and unconscious imitation of the observed facial movements – a “motor simulation”. At odds with this hypothesis, a previous study has shown that some individuals born with congenital facial paralysis are able to achieve a typical level of performance in sensitive facial expression recognition tasks. This suggests that efficient recognition of facial expressions might be achieved without motor simulation. Yet, it remains possible that individuals with congenital facial paralysis achieve this level of performance only at the cost of engaging more cognitive resources. Still, motor simulation might make facial expression recognition easier, less effortful or more automatic. Here, we address this possibility. We asked twenty typically developed participants and three individuals with congenital facial paralysis to categorize emotional sounds (e.g. anger vs fear) while looking at congruent or incongruent facial expressions (anger or fear). The faces were not helpful for the sound categorization task but important for a subsequent memory task. If motor simulation is necessary for effortless and automatic facial expression recognition, then only typically developed participants should be influenced by the congruency of the faces in the sound categorization task. In contrast with this prediction, all participants were either significantly slower and/or less accurate in the incongruent condition. These findings suggest that motor simulation is not necessary for effortless and automatic facial expression recognition.
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Carneiro, S., & Vannuscorps, G. (2024). Automatic facial expression recognition without motor simulation. The Seeing and Acting Worskhop: Functional and Neural Perspectives, Coimbra, Portugal. https://hdl.handle.net/2078.5/236756