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Jun 28, 2015 - Boston marathon bombing, the September 11 attacks, attacks on an Iraqi ... Utoya Norway attack, and the Beslan school attack in Russia.
Emotion Beyond pleasure and pain:Facial expression ambiguity in adults and children during intense situations --Manuscript Draft-Manuscript Number: Full Title:

Beyond pleasure and pain:Facial expression ambiguity in adults and children during intense situations

Abstract:

According to psychological models as well as common intuition, intense positive and negative situations evoke highly distinct emotional expressions. Nevertheless, recent work has shown that when judging isolated faces, the affective valence of winning and losing professional tennis players is hard to differentiate (Aviezer, Trope, & Todorov, 2012, Science, 338, 1225-1229). However, expressions produced by professional athletes during publicly broadcasted sports events may be strategically controlled. To shed light on this matter we examined if ordinary people's spontaneous facial expressions evoked during highly intense situations are diagnostic for the situational valence. In experiment 1 we compared reactions to highly intense positive situations (surprise soldier reunions) vs. highly intense negative situations (terror attacks). In experiment 2, we turned to children and compared facial reactions to highly positive situations (e.g., a child receiving a surprise trip to Disneyland) vs. highly negative situations (e.g., a child discovering her parents ate up all her Halloween candy). The results demonstrate that facial expressions of both adults and children are often not diagnostic for the valence of the situation. These findings demonstrate the ambiguity of extreme facial expressions and highlight the importance of context in everyday emotion perception.

Article Type:

Article

Keywords:

intense facial expressions; valence; arousal; spontaneous expressions

Corresponding Author:

Hillel Aviezer Hebrew University ISRAEL

Corresponding Author E-Mail:

[email protected]

Corresponding Author Secondary Information: Corresponding Author's Institution:

Hebrew University

Other Authors:

Sofia Wenzler Sarah Levine Rolf van Dick Viola Oertel-Knöchel

Corresponding Author's Secondary Institution: First Author:

Sofia Wenzler

Order of Authors Secondary Information: Manuscript Region of Origin:

ISRAEL

Suggested Reviewers:

Kristen Lindquist University of North Carolina [email protected] Expert in emotion and context effects on emotion perception David Sander University of Geneva [email protected] Expert in emotion and emotion perception

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Tobias Brosch University of Geneva [email protected] Expert on emotion perception Derek Isaacowitz Northeastern University [email protected] Expert on facial expression perception Jim Russell Boston College [email protected] Expert on emotion models Ron Dotsch Utrecht University [email protected] Expert on affective and social face perception Rasha Abdel Rachman Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin [email protected] Expert on affective and social face perception Opposed Reviewers: Order of Authors:

Sofia Wenzler Sarah Levine Rolf van Dick Viola Oertel-Knöchel Hillel Aviezer

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Cover Letter

28/06/15 David DeSteno, Editor Emotion Department of Psychology Northeastern University Boston, MA 02115 Dear Prof. DeSteno, Please consider the attached manuscript titled “Beyond pleasure and pain: Facial expression ambiguity in adults and children during intense situations” for publication as an original research report in Emotion. Leading psychological models as well as common intuition, posit that intense positive and negative situations evoke highly distinct emotional expressions. Yet contrary to predictions from these models, recent work has shown that when judging isolated faces, the affective valence of winning and losing professional tennis players is hard to differentiate (Aviezer, Trope, & Todorov, 2012, Science, 338, 1225-1229). While intriguing, extrapolating from expressions of publicly broadcasted professional athletes is problematic because the expressions may be strategically controlled and they occur during great physical exertion. Further, tennis faces include only adults, but children may express emotion differently. In the current report we examine if ordinary people’s spontaneous facial expressions evoked during highly intense situations are diagnostic for the situational valence. In experiment 1 we compared reactions to highly intense positive situations (surprise soldier reunions) vs. highly intense negative situations (terror attacks). In experiment 2, we turned to children and compared facial reactions to highly positive situations (e.g., a child receiving a surprise trip to Disneyland) vs. highly negative situations (e.g., a child discovering her parents ate up all her Halloween candy). The results demonstrate that facial expressions of both adults and children are often not diagnostic for the valence of the situation. These findings demonstrate the ambiguity of extreme facial expressions and highlight the importance of context in everyday emotion perception. We believe these results will prove interesting for a wide audience of readers and we hope you will consider this work for publication as a report in Emotion. In the following page we provide a list of potential experts reviewers. Thank you very much for considering our manuscript and requests. Sincerely, Hillel Aviezer: [email protected] Sofia Wenzler: [email protected] Sarah Levine: [email protected] Rolf van Dick: [email protected] Viola Oertel-Knöchel: [email protected]

Manuscript

Pleasure and Pain

PLEASURE AND PAIN

Beyond pleasure and pain: Facial expression ambiguity in adults and children during intense situations

Sofia Wenzler ¹, Sarah Levine ², Rolf van Dick ¹, Viola Oertel-Knöchel ¹, and Hillel Aviezer ³*

¹ Goethe-University of Frankfurt, Department of Psychiatry ² Muhlenberg College ³ Hebrew University of Jerusalem

*Corresponding author: Hillel Aviezer Department of Psychology The Hebrew University of Jerusalem Jerusalem, Israel [email protected]

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Pleasure and Pain

Abstract According to psychological models as well as common intuition, intense positive and negative situations evoke highly distinct emotional expressions. Nevertheless, recent work has shown that when judging isolated faces, the affective valence of winning and losing professional tennis players is hard to differentiate (Aviezer, Trope, & Todorov, 2012, Science, 338, 1225-1229). However, expressions produced by professional athletes during publicly broadcasted sports events may be strategically controlled. To shed light on this matter we examined if ordinary people’s spontaneous facial expressions evoked during highly intense situations are diagnostic for the situational valence. In experiment 1 we compared reactions to highly intense positive situations (surprise soldier reunions) vs. highly intense negative situations (terror attacks). In experiment 2, we turned to children and compared facial reactions to highly positive situations (e.g., a child receiving a surprise trip to Disneyland) vs. highly negative situations (e.g., a child discovering her parents ate up all her Halloween candy). The results demonstrate that facial expressions of both adults and children are often not diagnostic for the valence of the situation. These findings demonstrate the ambiguity of extreme facial expressions and highlight the importance of context in everyday emotion perception.

Keywords: intense facial expressions, valence, arousal, spontaneous expressions Word count: 4406

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Pleasure and Pain John loses his life savings in a stock market crash while Jill wins the national lottery. Imagine we were there taking a picture of them at the moment they heard the life changing news. Taking a close look at their facial displays, we would intuitively expect very distinct expressions of agony and ecstasy, respectively. Psychological models of emotion concur, as the difference between positive and negative affect is arguably one of the most central dimensions of psychological experience (Barrett, 2006; Suvak et al., 2011). According to basic emotion models, positive (e.g., happiness) and negative (e.g., fear) emotions arise from distinct affect programs, each equipped with dedicated hardwired neurological systems and distinct universally recognized facial movements (Ekman, 1993; Ekman & Cordaro, 2011; Tracy & Matsumoto, 2008). According to this line of thought, positive and negative emotions are expressed with very different action units and thus rarely confused. In fact, confusing positive and negative facial expressions is mostly characteristic of neuropsychological patients with rare forms of brain damage (Adolphs & Tranel, 2003; Aviezer, Hassin, & Bentin, 2011; Sato et al., 2002). According to dimensional emotion models there is no need to postulate discrete affect programs for separate emotions. Rather, this view holds that a small number of bipolar dimensions serve as the basic buildings blocks of affective experience (Fontaine, Scherer, Roesch, & Ellsworth, 2007; Russell, 1980). Specifically, the dimension of valence, ranging from pleasant to unpleasant, is key in defining emotional experience and expression. According to dimensional theorists, positive and negative expressions are conveyed very differently and should not be confused as “the face's normative preeminence is limited to quasi-physical features, pleasure, and arousal” (Carroll & Russell, 1996).

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Pleasure and Pain Further, both basic and dimensional models agree that positive and negative expressions should grow more distinct and recognizable as they become more intense. For example, basic emotion models predict that intense emotions activate maximally distinct facial muscles which increase discrimination (Calder et al., 2000; Hess, Blairy, & Kleck, 1997; Tracy, 2014). Similarly, dimensional emotion models, predict that intense emotions are located on more extreme and distant positions on the pleasure-displeasure axis and thus their positivity or negativity should be easier to decipher (Carroll & Russell, 1996; Russell, 1997). One caveat, however, of a large portion of previous work was the reliance on stereotypical facial expressions posed by actors in the lab (Ekman & Friesen, 1976; Matsumoto & Ekman, 1988; Russell, 1997). While such faces portray extreme emotion in a highly distinct and recognizable manner, they may differ from real-life portrayals of affect. For example, recent work using intense facial expressions of winners and losers during a professional tennis match demonstrated that their valence is highly ambiguous. In fact, when rating the valence of the isolated faces, winners and losers were both judged as conveying highly similar levels of negative valence (Aviezer et al., 2015; Aviezer, Trope, & Todorov, 2012). Thus, these findings seem to suggest that at least during extreme positive vs negative situations, the face may lose its affective diagnostic value to perceivers. Yet, the fact that the facial expressions in both above studies were taken from professional tennis players opens room for criticism. First, professional athletes are well aware that their displays are publicly viewed by a live crowd of thousands and millions more on TV. Perhaps one’s facial expressions are strategically altered in the face of such crowds (Fridlund et al., 1990; Hess, Banse, & Kappas, 1995). A second concern with tennis faces (or any other sport, for that matter) is that the expressions are produced amidst an extreme physical activity. It is possible that the confusability 4

Pleasure and Pain of the faces results from the high degree of physical exertion. A third concern is that sporting events may have specific cultural display rules – winners may conceal their smiles to maintain good sportsmanship. Finally, tennis expressions are limited to a very narrow age range as they exclusively represent adults who may be more selfconscious and may exert more control in their affective responses. The current study examined if highly intense positive and negative situations evoke highly distinct facial expressions while addressing these concerns. In experiment 1, we examined facial expressions during real-life extreme positive or negative situations that (a) are not televised or taking place in a staged context, (b) do not involve intense physical exertion and (c) do not involve professionals who are used to preforming in front of a camera. In experiment 2, we examined if the patterns of facial reactions to intense positive and negative situations differ when young children are examined instead of adults. In the following experiments we considered the individuals whose reactions were documented by camera as our actual “participants”. Lab participants in these studies were only used as raters of the authentic expressive faces. While the expressions were not evoked under controlled conditions and we have no measures of self-report to corroborate feelings, the benefits of such stimuli may outweigh the limitations. Specifically, the intensity, spontaneity, and authenticity of the facial expressions offer a considerable advantage that cannot be reproduced in the lab due to obvious ethical and practical reasons. Experiment 1 In experiment 1, we examined facial expressions during real-life extreme positive or negative situations. For the highly intense positive situations we analyzed reactions to meeting deployed US soldiers surprising family members upon their return. Surprise soldier reunions evoke highly intense spontaneous reactions 5

Pleasure and Pain amongst the surprised family members. The footage is documented on home videos, typically by an inside accomplice. For the highly intense negative situations we chose reactions of bystanders to terror attacks. The reactions included genuine emotional responses that occurred spontaneously amongst bystanders witnessing the negative unanticipated event. We did not include any expressions of people that were themselves physically wounded in the events. The chosen positive and negative situations differed vastly on the valence dimension, but shared extremely high degrees of arousal. If intense positive and negative emotions are expressed differently, then the face valence should consistently be expressed in a manner that corresponds to the situation valence. If however, emotional expressions during highly intense situations lose their diagnosticity, then faces would frequently express valence that does not correspond to the valence of the situation. Method Participants Emotion expressers. Emotional expressions of 36 different adult individuals were used: 18 (2 Males, 16 females) expressed emotions in response to a positive situation and 18 (3 Males, 15 females) expressed emotions in response to a negative situation¹. Expression raters. The expressions were rated by 28 undergraduate students (91 females, 1 males, Mean age = 24) from the Hebrew University in Israel who participated for course credit or payment. Stimuli Generation Our search for positive situations was conducted by searching for soldier reunion videos using YouTube and websites such as www.welcomehomeblog.com 6

Pleasure and Pain which is dedicated to the topic. The search for negative situations was conducted by a YouTube and Google image search of reactions to terror attacks including the Boston marathon bombing, the September 11 attacks, attacks on an Iraqi church, the Utoya Norway attack, and the Beslan school attack in Russia. Images and footage were included for further analysis if a clear portrayal of the face was available during the emotional reaction. We concluded the search when we reached 36 images (18 positive and 18 negative). In order to extract an image of the emotional reaction apex from the video footage we captured the emotional reaction occurring immediately after realization of the event (e.g., right after a mother realized the soldier in front of her was her son) and in which an unobstructed view of the face was available. If several frames qualified this criterion, we chose the moment of peak muscular intensity (irrespective of valence). In fact, the valence in adjacent frames appeared highly similar and stable and we came across no cases of valence oscillations in which minor shifts in the chosen frame would change the valence of the expression (see Figure 1).

Figure 1: An example of a sequence of frames from a positive situation reunion video. Time = 0 portrays the onset of the episode when the individual first sees the returned soldier, Time = 15 portrays the judged moment of peak intensity, and Time = 22 portrays the physical reunion in which the face was obstructed. As can be seen in this example, the valence of the face remained consistent across adjacent frames and over a fairly extended period of time. 7

Pleasure and Pain Still images were captured from the video footage and the face was cropped from the image using Photoshop (see Figure 2). Procedure The expressions were rated in two sequential blocks. In the first block, participants rated the facial valence using a 1 (most negative) to 9 (most positive) scale, with 5 serving as a neutral midpoint. In the second block, participants viewed the same images and rated their muscular intensity using a 1 (least intense) to 9 (most intense) scale. Because our main interest was in the valence ratings, this block appeared first to avoid learning effects and minimize contamination from intensity ratings. Image presentation within each block was randomized. Stimuli were presented for unlimited duration until a response was carried out. All studies reported were approved by the university IRB. Results The mean perceived valence and intensity, for each expression image, was calculated across raters. Images with a mean valence rating above 5 conveyed positive valence while those with a mean valence rating below 5 conveyed negative valence. Valence ratings. An item analysis showed that in the negative-situation pictures, 17 of the 18 images (94.4%) were judged as negative, 95% CI [83.7%, 100%]. In the positive-situation images, 14 of the 18 images (77.7%) were rated as negative, 95% CI [58.47%, 96.93%]. Thus negative-valence faces were fairly common during the intense positive situations. We also calculated the mean valence of expressions and found that it was negative (i.e., valence < 5) in both positive situations (M=3.73, SE=.44) and negative situations (M=3.36, SE=.27), see Figure 2. Further, mean valence ratings did not differ significantly across situations, t(34)=.7, p > .45. Similarly, the mean RT for 8

Pleasure and Pain rating the face valence did not differ significantly across the positive (M=2503.1ms, SE=131ms) vs. negative (M=2581.1ms, SE=99ms) situations, t(34)=.47, p > .6. Intensity ratings. The mean intensity of the expressions did not significantly differ in the positive (M=6.08, SE=.25) vs. negative situations (M=5.5, SE=.39), t(34)=1.1, p > .2. Similarly, the mean RT for rating the face intensity did not differ significantly across the positive (M=2484.6ms, SE=366ms) vs. negative (M=2551.5ms, SE=362ms) situations; t(34)=.55, p > .5.

Figure 2: A. Mean facial valence ratings in positive and negative situations (Experiment 1). Values that fall below the broken line represent negative valence. B. Examples of face reactions to highly intense positive/negative situations (1, 2, 4 = negative; 3, 5, 6 = positive). 9

Pleasure and Pain Experiment 2 Theories of emotional development disagree on whether discrete facial expressions become organized early in infancy (Izard, 1997) or if they gradually progress over time from broad positive-negative expressions to more differentiated emotional displays (Sroufe, 1997). Both views, however, agree that a basic distinction between expressions during positive and negative situations should be evident from a very early age. Further, children may provide a cleaner case study of emotional expressions than adults because they exert less regulation and less cognitive analysis of their emotional states (Markovits, 2013). Previous studies in young children compared reactions to receiving attractive or disappointing gifts (Saarni, 1984). While this work demonstrated that age and gender had moderating effects, overall, as intuitively predicted, children tended to display mostly positive expressions in the positive situation and mostly negative expressions in the negative situation (Cole, 1986; Kieras, Tobin, Graziano, & Rothbart, 2005; Saarni, 1984). However, the manipulation of emotion in such lab studies was quite mild and the experimental setting which involved strangers (i.e., the experimenters) may have discouraged uninhibited emotional reactions (Saarni, 1984). It is unclear if children would express such differentiated facial valence if exposed to more extreme positive and negative situations in their natural home environment. To examine reactions to extreme negative situations we analyzed facial expressions of children undergoing extreme pranks by their parents. The pranks were conducted to the comic request of ABC’s late-night TV host Jimmy Kimmel, who traditionally challenges parents to prank their children, record their reactions and send in their videos to the show via YouTube. In the first prank, children woke up 10

Pleasure and Pain following a night of trick-or-treating, discovered empty candy wrappings scattered around and were told that their parents ate up all their candy. In the second prank, children unwrapped their Christmas presents and discovered that their gift was in fact an ordinary and disappointing everyday item (e.g. a banana, a bar of soap, a jar of pickles etc). To examine reactions to extreme positive situations we collected facial reactions of children surprised with highly desired presents such as surprise tickets to a concert of an idolized rock star (e.g. Taylor Swift or Justin Bieber) or a surprise trip to Disneyland. Perhaps due to the nature of the positive gifts, our search yielded mostly positive videos of females receiving rock concert tickets. Because we wanted to minimize any systematic gender and age differences in expressivity (Chaplin & Aldao, 2013) and emotion regulation (Saarni, 1984) across the positive and negative situations, we focused our study on girls in their middle childhood years (~ages 5-9) (Corsaro, 1997; Kail & Cavanaugh, 2015). As in experiment 1, the positive and negative situations differed vastly on the valence dimension, but shared high degrees of arousal. If intense positive and negative emotions are expressed differently by children, then the face valence should consistently be expressed in a manner that corresponds to the situation valence. If however, emotional expressions during highly intense situations lose their diagnosticity, then faces would frequently express valence that does not correspond to the valence of the situation. Method Participants

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Pleasure and Pain Emotion expressers. Emotional expressions of 64 different girls were used: 35 expressed emotions in response to a positive situation and 29 expressed emotions in response to a negative situation. Expression raters. The expressions were rated by 39 undergraduate students (29 females, 10 males; Mean age = 25.1) from the Hebrew University who participated for course credit or payment.

Stimuli Generation As noted, our search for positive situation reactions yielded a vast majority of females receiving rock concert tickets. Consequently, in order to avoid gender differences in the positive and negative situations we restricted our search of negative situation reactions to females as well. Our initial search yielded 64 video clips (35 positive and 29 negative) that presented with adequate picture quality and face visibility during the emotional reaction. The apex of the emotional reaction was determined by choosing the modal response of four judges who viewed each film in mute and chose the moment that conveyed the highest intensity (irrespective of valence), see Figure 3. As in experiment 1, the valence in adjacent frames appeared highly similar and stable and we came across no cases of rapid valence oscillations in which minor shifts in the chosen frame would change the valence of the expression. Determining the age of the girls was self-evident in 28% of the videos because the age of the children was clearly deducible from the title, content or description of the clip. In the remaining videos in which age was unknown, we assessed the age by averaging the judgments of expert child and youth psychotherapists (N=3 females)

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Pleasure and Pain estimating the age of the children based on their physical appearance and behaviour in the video clips. Procedure As in experiment 1, the expressions were rated in two sequential blocks. In the first block, participants rated the facial valence using a 1 (most negative) to 9 (most positive) scale, with 5 serving as a neutral midpoint. In the second block, participants viewed the same images and rated their muscular intensity using a 1 (least intense) to 9 (most intense) scale. Image presentation within each block was randomized. Stimuli were presented for unlimited duration until a response was carried out. Results Age matched analysis An analysis on the age of the girls revealed that in the negative situations the age was significantly lower (M=5.2, SE=.23) than in the positive situations (M=9.7, SE=.47), t(28)= 8.8, p< .001. Because our main interest was to compare emotional reactions across similar aged children we first focused our analysis on a subset of 24 age matched girls (12 positive situations and 12 negative situations) in their middle childhood years (~ages 5-9) (Corsaro, 1997; Kail & Cavanaugh, 2015). In this subset, the Mean approximated age in the positive situations was 7.1 years (range 69) and the Mean approximated age in the negative situations was 6.5 years (range 5.7-8), a non-significant difference, t(11)=1.9, p >.05. Valence ratings. The mean perceived valence, for each expression image, was calculated across raters. An item analysis showed that in the negative-situation pictures, 11 of the 12 images (91.6%) were judged as negative, 95% CI [75.1%,

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Pleasure and Pain 100%]. In the positive-situation images, 8 of the 12 images (66.6%) were rated as negative, 95% CI [39.92% to 93.28%]. Thus, as in experiment 1, negative-valence faces were common during the intense positive situations The mean valence of expressions was negative (i.e., valence < 5) in both positive situations (M=4.6, SE=.55) and negative situations (M=3.1, SE=.37), see figure 3. However, the valence ratings were significantly higher in the positive than the negative situations, t(22)=2.5, p < .05. The mean RT for rating the face valence showed a trend for a difference across the positive (M=2676.5.1ms, SE=167ms) vs. negative (M=2273.7ms, SE=107ms) situations, t(22)=2.02, p = .06. Intensity ratings. The mean intensity of the expressions did not significantly differ in the positive (M=6.47, SE=.27) vs. negative situations (M=5.6, SE=.61), t(34)=1.1, p > .2. The mean RT for rating the face intensity did not differ significantly across the positive (M=2278ms, SE=68.8ms) vs. negative (M=2216ms, SE=101ms) situations; t(34)=.55, p > .5. Non age-matched analysis Because we selected a subgroup of age matched girls for our main analyses, we wanted to confirm that the subgroup’s overall pattern of behaviour did not differ markedly from that of the entire group. We therefore assessed the valence in the entire 64 images. An item analysis showed that in the negative-situation pictures, 28 of the 29 images (96.5%) were judged as negative, 95% CI [86.1%, 100%]. In the positive-situation images, 18 of the 35 images (51.4%) were rated as negative, 95% CI [23.12%, 79.68%]. The mean valence of expressions in the positive situations (M=5.3, SE=.36) was significantly higher than in the negative situations, (M=2.98, SE=.18), t(28)=5.1, p < .001. Thus, the overall pattern replicated (though in a slightly 14

Pleasure and Pain less extreme form) showing a significant portion of negative reactions to positive situations in the full set, even though the images of positive and negative situations were not matched for age.

Figure 3: A. Mean age-matched facial valence ratings in positive and negative situations (Experiment 2). Values that fall below the broken line represent negative valence. B. Examples of face reactions to highly intense positive/negative situations (1, 4, 5 = positive; 2, 3, 6 = negative).

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General discussion The present findings add further support to the notion that facial expressions produced during highly intense positive vs. negative situations often convey very similar degrees of valence. The main findings of experiment 1 replicate and extend the results previously reported with winning and losing tennis players (Aviezer et al., 2012). The current findings suggest that the perceived confusability between positive and negative tennis expressions is not merely an artifact of the public, televised setting, nor is it unique to the realm of competitive sports. Furthermore, unlike reactions to winning and losing in tennis, the expressions we analyzed in both experiments did not occur in situations involving physical effort. We further demonstrated that this pattern of behavior is not limited to adults. Children, like adults, tend to express negative appearing facial reactions to highly positive situations. Since it is unlikely that the children are deliberately acting in a negative manner, these reactions seem to convey an authentic response to the highly positive situation. Anecdotally, we note that the expression of negative emotions during positive situations was often confusing to children and parents alike. Comments such as “Why are you crying?” and “if you aren’t happy, I’ll take it back!” were not uncommon. Unlike experiment 1 though, the reactions of children were more differentiated: Facial expressions occurring in the positive situation were rated as conveying significantly less negative valence than those occurring in the negative situation. While it is possible that children’s extreme expressions are more differentiated and diagnostic than those of adults, it is also likely that the type and intensity of emotions differed in the situations of the adults and the children. For example, reuniting with a loved one and receiving a trip to Disney may both be positive, but they are obviously

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Pleasure and Pain different. At the least, we can conclude that children, like adults, often express negative appearing facial reactions to highly positive situations. While the advantages of using real life videos are clear, this approach also has significant caveats. The images and footage were taken from the internet and therefore we cannot exclude the possibility that the stimuli underwent some initial screening bias. Specifically, it is unclear if the high percentage of females we encountered results from a real gender difference in expressivity (Fischer & LaFrance, 2015) or from a cultural bias in which it is more legitimate to posting the emotional reactions of girls online (Fischer, Eagly, & Oosterwijk, 2013). What theoretical mechanism may underlie the robust observational findings in this study? Some theoretical accounts propose that tearing during positive situations may reflect a response to negative memories and thoughts (Feldman, 1956). Others suggest that tears during positive events reflect a relief response in which withheld agony is suddenly released (Ekman, 2007). Still others suggest that tears express helplessness in response to being overwhelmed by strong emotion (Tan & Frijda, 1999). While these approaches may be useful in explaining some aspects of high intensity emotions they do not explain all cases of intense emotion behavior. For example, it is unclear why unexpectedly receiving a highly appetitive gift would evoke negative memories or withheld agony. The notion of helplessness is appealing and parsimonious (Vingerhoets, 2013) yet it does not explain why tearing and crying do not typically occur in other overwhelming strong emotions such as disgust. One recent functional proposal suggests that humans express negative emotions during positive situations as an adaptive means of emotional regulation (Aragón, Clark, Dyer, & Bargh, 2015). According to this account, during extreme situations people reach an overwhelming emotional peak which may be deleterious to their psychological and physical state. By expressing emotions that are opposite to 17

Pleasure and Pain the situation’s valence, individuals may balance one emotion with the expression of another, thereby reinstating emotional equilibrium. This theory nicely explains the existence of negative reactions during highly positive situations. However, this account also predicts the reverse pattern: positive reactions during negative situations. While prior work has demonstrated elevation of lip corners during the viewing of sad movies (Fredrickson & Levenson, 1998) there is little evidence in our data for such behavior as the negative situations in our sample rarely evoked positive smiling behavior. This asymmetry is also true for the expressions of winners and losers in professional sports: winners often appear negative but losers rarely appear positive (Aviezer et al., 2015; Aviezer et al., 2012). As the emotional experiences of our expressers were arguably more intense than those evoked by watching a sad movie (as in Fredrickson & Levenson, 1998), one would have expected many more positive reactions during the negative situations in an attempt to return to equilibrium. Thus Aragón’s (2015) model is more useful for some cases than others. Interestingly, all the aforementioned approaches share the assumption that crying is inherently a negative response. However, the alternative possibility may also be viable, namely, that the phenomenological experience during highly intense positive situations is actually highly positive and that facial expressions during such moments of peak intensity not diagnostic of the inner feeling (Kayyal, Widen, & Russell, 2015). Being surprised by one’s son returning from deployment most likely evokes a range of positive emotions, and perhaps some counterfactual negative emotions (Markman & McMullen, 2005), but the summarized overall experience is likely a very positive one. Conversely, witnessing a terror act most likely evokes a range of negative emotions, and perhaps even some positive emotions such as morbid fascination (Penfold-Mounce, 2015), but the summarized overall experience 18

Pleasure and Pain is likely a very negative one. Nevertheless, isolated facial expressions during such positive and negative events may not be perceived as conveying different valence. We do not consider this finding as evidence of a dysfunctional expression system because in our view, facial expressions always contain some degree of ambiguity and contextual information (e.g., body language and scene information) is utilized to resolve this ambiguity (Aviezer, Hassin, Bentin, & Trope, 2008a; Aviezer et al., 2008b; Barrett, Mesquita, & Gendron, 2011; Meeren, van Heijnsbergen, & de Gelder, 2005; Righart & de Gelder, 2008; Wieser & Brosch, 2012). Finally, it is important to make a distinction between the objective movements in the muscles of the face and between the judgments of valence from the face. Although human raters may not easily distinguish the valence of faces from positive and negative situations, this does not mean that the faces are identical. In fact, recent work with faces of winners and losers in tennis has demonstrated that the faces bear several objective differences, however, human viewers fail to utilize them when judging the valence of the faces (Aviezer et al., 2015). Similarly, human perceivers are poor at differentiating facial expressions of real from fake pain despite objective cues that differentiate the two (Bartlett, Littlewort, Frank, & Lee, 2014). In future work it would be interesting to examine if, and what, objective facial movements differentiate negative expressions during negative situations from negative expressions during positive situations. To summarize, we presented observational evidence that the valence of facial behavior expressed during real-life, intense positive vs. negative situations is often hard to differentiate. Specifically, negative valence responses are common during positive situations, and this is true for adults as well as children. The results replicate and extend prior findings, indicating that emotional responses during extreme situations diverge from standard basic emotion (Ekman, 1993) and dimensional 19

Pleasure and Pain (Russell, 1997)model predictions. Together, these findings demonstrate the ambiguity of extreme facial expressions and highlight the critical importance of context in emotion perception (Aviezer et al., 2012; Barrett, 2014; Barrett et al., 2011; Kayyal et al., 2015).

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Pleasure and Pain References

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Footnote

¹ Due to a technical error, an 11 year old girl appeared in our adult sample of reactions during positive situations. However, subsequent analysis showed that removing this stimulus had no significant effect on the results.

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by an Israel Science Foundation [ISF#1140/13] grant to Hillel Aviezer and by a Minerva Fellowship to Sofia Wenzler.

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