Gender Differences in Gaze Perception of Emotionally Expressive Faces: An ERP Study

Previous studies have demonstrated that men and women perceive the gaze direction of emotional faces differently. However, the neural mechanism underlying the gender differences in gaze direction perception were unknown. Here, we investigated whether incongruent gaze direction of emotional faces can elicit different event-related potential N270 component waveforms in men versus women. Participants performed an identity judgment task based on the S1-S2 paradigm. The gaze direction of S1-S2 was either congruent or incongruent. The results showed incongruent gaze direction of neutral faces elicited greater N270 only in women, while incongruent gaze direction of angry faces elicited greater N270 only in men. These findings suggest that women are more sensitive to perception of the gaze directions of neutral faces, and men have a more sensitive accurate perception of the gaze directions of angry faces. Our findings provide neural evidence for gender differences in the integration of gaze direction and facial expression.