Categorical Perception of Fear and Anger Expressions in Whole, Masked and Composite Faces.

ABSTRACT: Human observers are remarkably proficient at recognizing expressions of emotions and at readily grouping them into distinct categories. When morphing one facial expression into another, the linear changes in low-level features are insufficient to describe the changes in perception, which instead follow an s-shaped function. Important questions are, whether there are single diagnostic regions in the face that drive categorical perception for certain parings of emotion expressions, and how information in those regions interacts when presented together. We report results from two experiments with morphed fear-anger expressions, where (a) half of the face was masked or (b) composite faces made up of different expressions were presented. When isolated upper and lower halves of faces were shown,

SUBMITTER: Wegrzyn M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4532458 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature