Blocking mimicry makes true and false smiles look the ...

Blocking  mimicry  makes  true  and  false   smiles  look  the  same True

False Onset  and  apex   duration Orbicularis  oculi   activation Symmetry

Magdalena  Rychlowska,  Elena  Cañadas,  Adrienne  Wood,   Eva  Krumhuber,  Agneta  Fischer,  &  Paula  Niedenthal

My  name  is  Adrienne  Wood  and  I  will  be  presen4ng  work  that  was  spearheaded  by  my  colleague,  Magdalena  Rychlowska.     Smiles  are  an  incredibly  diverse  category  of  facial  expressions  that  serve  a  variety  of  different  func4ons.  One  way  to  classify  smiles  is  the  degree  to  which  they  are  spontaneously-­‐produced.  In  general,  research  suggests  that  spontaneous,  or  true,  smiles   involve  more  orbicularis  oculi,  have  a  slower  onset  and  briefer  apex,  and  tend  to  be  more  symmetric  than  false  smiles.  These  dis4nc4ons  are  incredibly  subtle  and  dynamic,  making  the  task  of  recognizing  smile  genuineness  no  small  task.  So  how  do  we  do  it?    

Facial  Mimicry

[ADD  IN  IMAGES  OF  AVATARS  FROM  MARINGER]

Maringer  et  al.  (2011) Evidence  suggests  that  facial  mimicry  plays  a  role  in  emo4on  processing.  According  to  embodied  simula4on  accounts  of  emo4on  processing,  facial  mimicry  involves  overtly  or  covertly  recrea4ng  the   perceived  expression  with  our  own  facial  muscles,  which  provides  us  with  afferent  facial  feedback  and  facilitates  simula4on  of  the  corresponding  emo4onal  state.  There  is  now  a  growing  collec4on   of  evidence  sugges4ng  that  facial  mimicry  promotes  accurate  recogni4on  of  emo4ons.     Maringer  and  colleagues  blocking  par4cipants’  facial  mimicry  by  having  them  hold  a  pen  between  their  lips  and  found  that  it  reduced  discrimina4on  of  true  and  false  smiles  produced  by  animated   agents.  This  paper  was  a  first  step  in  demonstra4ng  the  importance  of  facial  mimicry  in  subtle  emo4on  judgments,  but  it  had  a  few  limita4ons.  The  animated  “true”  and  “false”  smiles  differed  only  in   onset  dura4on,  with  “true”  smiles  emerging  more  slowly  than  false  smiles.  We  now  know  that  other  features  besides  onset  dura4on,  such  as  asymmetry,  can  differen4ate  voluntary  and  involuntary   facial  expressions.  Another  shortcoming  of  this  first  set  of  studies  was  the  lack  of  a  comparable  control  condi4on:  it  is  possible  that  holding  a  pen  between  your  lips  is  distrac4ng  or  fa4guing,  which   could  account  for  the  reduced  discrimina4on  between  true  and  false  smiles.  So,  while  these  studies  were  an  important  first  step,  it  was  necessary  to  replicate  and  improve  on  the  findings.  We  did   this  in  a  series  of  3  studies,  which  validated  the  use  of  mouthguards  as  a  mimicry  inhibi4ng  technique,  and  then  used  them  to  test  the  role  of  mimicry  in  judgments  of  smile  genuineness.  

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Study  1 Within-­‐subject   mimicry  conditions

Task

Measure  of  mimicry Reduced  target-­‐ perceiver   zygomatic   synchrony  with   mouthguard

Passive  viewing Krumhuber  and   Manstead  (2009)

The  first  study  served  to  validate  our  novel  mimicry-­‐blocking  technique.  Using  a  within-­‐subject  design,  par4cipants  completed  a  passive  video  viewing  task  while  wearing  a  sports  mouthguard  and  without  a  mouthguard.  They  viewed  12   videos  of  true  and  false  smiles  produced  by  par4cipants  in  a  previous  study.  The  true  smile  s4muli  were  spontaneous  reac4ons  to  amusing  s4muli  accompanied  by  self-­‐reported  high  posi4ve  emo4ons,  and  the  false  smiles  were  those  same   actors  following  instruc4ons  to  “look  as  though  they  felt  amused.”  We  defined  mimicry  as  the  extent  to  which  par4cipants’  zygoma4c  ac4vity  was  temporally  matched  to  that  of  the  actors  in  the  videos.  We  therefore  correlated  par4cipants’   EMG  ac4vity  over  the  course  of  each  trial  with  the  facial  muscle  ac4vity  of  the  actors  in  the  videos,  as  measured  frame-­‐by-­‐frame  using  the  Computer  Expression  Recogni4on  Toolbox,  and  found  greater  synchrony  between  target  and   par4cipant  in  the  free  mimicry  condi4on.  Study  1  therefore  provided  strong  evidence  that  the  mouthguard  does  in  fact  interrupt  par4cipants’  ability  to  mimic  perceived  facial  expressions,  so  we  went  on  to  test  its  effects  on  judgments  of  smile   genuineness.  

Study  2  and  3  design Study  2

Study  3 Mimicry  blocked Muscle  control Free  mimicry

Studies  2  and  3  were  pre[y  much  iden4cal.  Par4cipants  were  assigned  to  either  the  blocked  mimicry  condi4on,  where  they  wore  a  mouthguard,  or  one  of  two  control  condi4ons.  In  the  muscle  control  condi4on  par4cipants  were  instructed  to  grip  a  ball   throughout  the  task  so  that  we  could  inves4gate  whether  the  effect  of  the  mouthguard  on  judgments  was  simply  due  to  distrac4on.  Par4cipants  in  the  second  control  condi4on  were  allowed  to  mimic  freely,  and  in  study  3,  also  wore  a  finger  heart  rate   monitor.  The  finger  cuff  is  an  appropriate  counterbalance  to  the  mouthguard,  as  they  both  required  an  ini4al  fi]ng.  All  par4cipants  then  watched  the  videos  of  true  and  false  smiles  from  study  1.  A^er  viewing  each  video,  they  were  asked  to  rate  the   perceived  genuineness  of  the  smile.    

Genuineness  ratings  by  condition Study  2 *

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Study  3 ***

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As  a  reminder,  we  predicted  that  par4cipants  in  the  blocked  mimicry  condi4on  would  not  dis4nguish  between  true  and  false  smiles  to  the  same  extent  as  par4cipants  who  were  allowed  to  freely  mimic.  In  both  studies,  this  is  what  we  found.   As  you  can  see,  the  difference  in  genuineness  ra4ngs  for  true  and  false  smiles  was  greater  in  the  free  mimicry  control  condi4ons  than  in  the  blocked  mimicry  condi4on.  This  effect  cannot  be  a[ributed  to  the  mouthguard  distrac4ng  or   otherwise  fa4guing  the  par4cipants.  These  studies  therefore  provide  strong  support  for  the  role  facial  mimicry  plays  in  decoding  subtle  facial  expressions.  While  we  only  examined  smiles,  we  consider  them  a  case  study  and  expect  similarly   subtle  judgments  about  facial  expressions,  such  as  detec4ng  true  and  false  anger,  to  also  require  facial  mimicry.           The  current  work,  combined  with  the  ini4al  studies  by  Maringer  and  colleagues,  goes  beyond  previous  studies  that  tested  the  effects  of  blocking  mimicry,  which  o^en  ask  par4cipants  to  label  expressions  at  the  basic  category  level,   such  as  “happy”  versus  “disgusted.”  Here  we  demonstrate  that  facial  mimicry  provides  the  perceiver  with  informa4on  beyond  emo4on  category,  such  as  the  degree  to  which  a  facial  expression  is  genuine  or  spontaneous.  In  a  separate  line  of   work,  I  have  found  that  mimicry  does  not  simply  facilitate  accurate  labeling  or  ra4ng  of  expressions,  but  also  changes  low-­‐level  perceptual  discrimina4on  of  facial  expressions.  Our  lab  is  also  extending  these  ideas  to  a  popula4on  of  pa4ents   with  facial  palsy,  which  will  provide  us  with  further  insight  into  the  fundamental  role  our  own  faces  play  in  the  percep4on  of  others’  emo4ons.  Thank  you  very  much  for  your  4me,  I  can  now  take  a  ques4on.