The impact on emotion classification performance and gaze behavior of foveal versus extrafoveal processing of facial features.
J Exp Psychol Hum Percept Perform
; 46(3): 292-312, 2020 Mar.
Article
in En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-32077743
At normal interpersonal distances all features of a face cannot fall within one's fovea simultaneously. Given that certain facial features are differentially informative of different emotions, does the ability to identify facially expressed emotions vary according to the feature fixated and do saccades preferentially seek diagnostic features? Previous findings are equivocal. We presented faces for a brief time, insufficient for a saccade, at a spatial position that guaranteed that a given feature-an eye, cheek, the central brow, or mouth-fell at the fovea. Across 2 experiments, observers were more accurate and faster at discriminating angry expressions when the high spatial-frequency information of the brow was projected to their fovea than when 1 or other cheek or eye was. Performance in classifying fear and happiness (Experiment 1) was not influenced by whether the most informative features (eyes and mouth, respectively) were projected foveally or extrafoveally. Observers more accurately distinguished between fearful and surprised expressions (Experiment 2) when the mouth was projected to the fovea. Reflexive first saccades tended toward the left and center of the face rather than preferentially targeting emotion-distinguishing features. These results reflect the integration of task-relevant information across the face constrained by the differences between foveal and extrafoveal processing (Peterson & Eckstein, 2012). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).
Full text:
1
Collection:
01-internacional
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Social Perception
/
Emotions
/
Eye Movements
/
Facial Expression
/
Facial Recognition
Type of study:
Prognostic_studies
Limits:
Adult
/
Female
/
Humans
/
Male
Language:
En
Journal:
J Exp Psychol Hum Percept Perform
Year:
2020
Document type:
Article
Country of publication:
United States