Data_Sheet_1_Recognition of Emotions From Facial Point-Light Displays.docx

Facial emotion recognition occupies a prominent place in emotion psychology. How perceivers recognize messages conveyed by faces can be studied in either an explicit or an implicit way, and using different kinds of facial stimuli. In the present study, we explored for the first time how facial point-light displays (PLDs) (i.e., biological motion with minimal perceptual properties) can elicit both explicit and implicit mechanisms of facial emotion recognition. Participants completed tasks of explicit or implicit facial emotion recognition from PLDs. Results showed that point-light stimuli are sufficient to allow facial emotion recognition, be it explicit and implicit. We argue that this finding could encourage the use of PLDs in research on the perception of emotional cues from faces.

面部情绪识别在情绪心理学中占据重要地位。研究者可通过外显或内隐的实验范式，结合不同类型的面部刺激，探究个体识别面部所传递情绪信息的方式。在本研究中，我们首次探讨了面部光点显示（point-light displays, PLDs，即仅保留最低限度知觉属性的生物运动信号）如何触发面部情绪识别的外显与内隐机制。被试需完成基于PLDs的外显或内隐面部情绪识别任务。实验结果表明，光点刺激足以支撑面部情绪识别，无论该识别过程为外显还是内隐。我们认为，该发现可推动PLDs在面部情绪线索知觉相关研究中的应用。