Emotional Mimicry: Why and When We Mimic Emotions

Facial mimicry interference reduces working memory accuracy for facial emotion expressions

Facial mimicry, the tendency to imitate facial expressions of other individuals, has been shown to play a critical role in the processing of emotion expressions. At the same time, there is evidence suggesting that its role might change when the cognitive demands of the situation increase. In such situations, understanding another person is dependent on working memory. However, whether facial mimicry influences working memory representations for facial emotion expressions is not fully understood. In the present study, we experimentally interfered with facial mimicry by using established behavioral procedures, and investigated how this interference influenced working memory recall for facial emotion expressions. Healthy, young adults (N = 36) performed an emotion expression n-back paradigm with two levels of working memory load, low (1-back) and high (2-back), and three levels of mimicry interference: high, low, and no interference. Results showed that, after controlling for block order and individual differences in the perceived valence and arousal of the stimuli, the high level of mimicry interference impaired accuracy when working memory load was low (1-back) but, unexpectedly, not when load was high (2-back). Working memory load had a detrimental effect on performance in all three mimicry conditions. We conclude that facial mimicry might support working memory for emotion expressions when task load is low, but that the supporting effect possibly is reduced when the task becomes more cognitively challenging.

Atypical Facial Expressivity in Young Children with Problematic Peer Relationships

Peer problems are frequently associated with difficulties in recognizing and appraising the emotions of others. It has been argued that facial responsiveness to others' emotions-or motor empathy-is a precursor of emotion processing and affective empathy. Although mimicry impairments have been observed in studies of young people with conduct problems, to our knowledge no study has examined facial responsiveness to others' expressions in young children and examined how this relates to peer relationship problems. Four- to 7-year-old children (n = 91) with or without teacher-reported peer relationship problems (Strength and Difficulties Questionnaire) viewed three dynamic film clips depicting a sad, happy, or scared child, while their spontaneous facial emotional responses were assessed using iMotions software that codes the movement of facial muscles. Children displayed facial expressivity that was congruent with the emotional expressions in the clips. Groups with and without peer problems did not differ in their responses to seeing a happy child. However, children with peer problems exhibited reduced or atypical facial emotional responses to the negative emotional clips. Decreased or atypical facial expressivity to negative emotions was also associated with severity of peer problems; atypical facial responsivity to sadness and reduced facial responsivity to fear predicted peer problems independently of one another. We conclude that reduced or atypical facial expressiveness in response to other children's dynamic facial expressions is associated with problematic peer relations in young children. The implications for early identification and interventions to support prosocial development are discussed.

Facial icons as indexes of emotions and intentions

Various objects and artifacts incorporate representations of faces, encompassing artworks like portraits, as well as ethnographic or industrial artifacts such as masks or humanoid robots. These representations exhibit diverse degrees of human-likeness, serving different functions and objectives. Despite these variations, they share common features, particularly facial attributes that serve as building blocks for facial expressions-an effective means of communicating emotions. To provide a unified conceptualization for this broad spectrum of face representations, we propose the term "facial icons" drawing upon Peirce's semiotic concepts. Additionally, based on these semiotic principles, we posit that facial icons function as indexes of emotions and intentions, and introduce a significant anthropological theory aligning with our proposition. Subsequently, we support our assertions by examining processes related to face and facial expression perception, as well as sensorimotor simulation processes involved in discerning others' mental states, including emotions. Our argumentation integrates cognitive and experimental evidence, reinforcing the pivotal role of facial icons in conveying mental states.

CAEVR: Biosignals-Driven Context-Aware Empathy in Virtual Reality

There is little research on how Virtual Reality (VR) applications can identify and respond meaningfully to users' emotional changes. In this paper, we investigate the impact of Context-Aware Empathic VR (CAEVR) on the emotional and cognitive aspects of user experience in VR. We developed a real-time emotion prediction model using electroencephalography (EEG), electrodermal activity (EDA), and heart rate variability (HRV) and used this in personalized and generalized models for emotion recognition. We then explored the application of this model in a context-aware empathic (CAE) virtual agent and an emotion-adaptive (EA) VR environment. We found a significant increase in positive emotions, cognitive load, and empathy toward the CAE agent, suggesting the potential of CAEVR environments to refine user-agent interactions. We identify lessons learned from this study and directions for future work.

Putting a label on someone: impact of schizophrenia stigma on emotional mimicry, liking, and interpersonal closeness

Affiliation is both an antecedent and a consequence of emotional mimicry (i.e. imitating a counterpart's emotional expression). Thus, interacting with a disliked partner can decrease emotional mimicry, which in turn can further decrease liking. This perpetuating circle has not been investigated in the context of mental health stigma yet. The present study tested the influence of the label "schizophrenia" on liking, interpersonal closeness, and emotional mimicry. In an online experiment (n = 201), participants recruited from the general population saw several videos of actors displaying emotional expressions. Actors were described with one of four labels: "schizophrenia", "healthy", "diabetes", and a negative adjective (e.g. "hot-tempered"). Emotional mimicry was measured using OpenFace 2.2. Liking and interpersonal closeness were assessed with questionnaires. Overall, compared to other labels, participants reported less liking and interpersonal closeness to the actor with the schizophrenia label. However, no effect on emotional mimicry was found. The decreased liking of the schizophrenia actors was explained by a lack of knowledge about schizophrenia and the explicit stigma of schizophrenia. Our study contributes to the literature by highlighting the need to reduce the stigma of schizophrenia.

Deep learning reveals what facial expressions mean to people in different cultures

Cross-cultural studies of the meaning of facial expressions have largely focused on judgments of small sets of stereotypical images by small numbers of people. Here, we used large-scale data collection and machine learning to map what facial expressions convey in six countries. Using a mimicry paradigm, 5,833 participants formed facial expressions found in 4,659 naturalistic images, resulting in 423,193 participant-generated facial expressions. In their own language, participants also rated each expression in terms of 48 emotions and mental states. A deep neural network tasked with predicting the culture-specific meanings people attributed to facial movements while ignoring physical appearance and context discovered 28 distinct dimensions of facial expression, with 21 dimensions showing strong evidence of universality and the remainder showing varying degrees of cultural specificity. These results capture the underlying dimensions of the meanings of facial expressions within and across cultures in unprecedented detail.

What Makes Groups Emotional?

When people experience emotions in a group, their emotions tend to have stronger intensity and to last longer. Why is that? This question has occupied thinkers throughout history, and with the use of digital media it is even more pressing today. Historically, attention has mainly focused on processes driven by the way emotions are shared between people via emotional interactions. Although interactions are a major driver of group emotionality, I review empirical findings that suggest that understanding group emotionality requires a broader view that integrates two additional processes: how emotions unfold within the social infrastructure in which they are shared and how these processes are affected by people's cognition about emotions. I propose to summarize the literature using an infrastructure-cognition-interaction framework that contributes to a broader understanding of group emotionality, which should improve our ability to predict group emotionality and to change these emotions when they are undesired.

Emotion contagion and physiological synchrony: The more intimate relationships, the more contagion of positive emotions

The study aimed to explore how interpersonal closeness (friends vs. strangers) and emotion type (positive vs. negative) influenced emotion contagion and physiological synchrony between interacting partners. Twenty-eight friend dyads (n = 56) and 29 stranger dyads (n = 58) participated in an emotion contagion laboratory task. In each dyad, one participant, the 'sender', was randomly asked to watch a film clip (neutral, positive, or negative), while their partner, the 'observer' passively observed the sender's facial expressions. Participants' electrocardiograms (ECG) and facial electromyography (EMG) signals were recorded using the BIOPAC system. Results revealed that observing the sender's facial expressions led to the observer's spontaneous mimicry and emotional contagion, accompanied by enhanced physiological synchrony between interacting partners. In the positive emotion condition, the observers reported more positive emotions and displayed stronger zygomaticus major activity in friend dyads than in stranger dyads. Greater physiological synchrony (heart rate and heart rate variability) between interacting partners was also observed in friend dyads than in stranger dyads in the positive emotion condition. These results indicate that positive emotion contagion is more likely to occur between close partners than negative emotion contagion.

When emotion expression will (and will not) enhance listening and responsiveness

We theorize that expressing emotion often will enhance listening and responsiveness in communal relationships because the nature of cooperation called for in communal relationships often matches five functions that expressing emotion can serve. The same is less frequently true for other types of relationships.

No evidence for modulation of facial mimicry by attachment tendencies in adulthood: an EMG investigation

Mimicking another individual functions as a social glue: it smoothens the interaction and fosters affiliation. Here, we investigated whether the intrinsic motivation to affiliate with others, stemming from attachment relationships, modulates individuals' engagement in facial mimicry (FM). Participants (N = 100; MAge = 24.54 years, SDAge = 3.90 years) observed faces with happy, sad, and neutral expressions, while their facial muscle activity was recorded with electromyography. Attachment was measured with the Attachment Styles Questionnaire, which provides a multidimensional profile for preoccupied and dismissing styles. It was proposed that the preoccupied and dismissing styles are characterized by high and low intrinsic affiliation motivation, respectively, and these were hypothesized to manifest in enhanced and diminished FM. Participants showed happy and sad FM, yet attachment styles did not significantly predict FM. Bayes Factor analyses lend evidence favoring the null hypothesis, suggesting that adult attachment do not contribute to FM.

Measuring facial mimicry: Affdex vs. EMG

Facial mimicry is the automatic imitation of the facial affect expressions of others. It serves as an important component of interpersonal communication and affective co-experience. Facial mimicry has so far been measured by Electromyography (EMG), which requires a complex measuring apparatus. Recently, software for measuring facial expressions have become available, but it is still unclear how well it is suited for measuring facial mimicry. This study investigates the comparability of the automated facial coding software Affdex with EMG for measuring facial mimicry. For this purpose, facial mimicry was induced in 33 subjects by presenting naturalistic affect-expressive video sequences (anger, joy). The response of the subjects is measured simultaneously by facial EMG (corrugator supercilii muscle, zygomaticus major muscle) and by Affdex (action units lip corner puller and brow lowerer and affects joy and anger). Subsequently, the correlations between the measurement results of EMG and Affdex were calculated. After the presentation of the joy stimulus, there was an increase in zygomaticus muscle activity (EMG) about 400 ms after stimulus onset and an increase in joy and lip corner puller activity (Affdex) about 1200 ms after stimulus onset. The joy and the lip corner puller activity detected by Affdex correlate significantly with the EMG activity. After presentation of the anger stimulus, corrugator muscle activity (EMG) also increased approximately 400 ms after stimulus onset, whereas anger and brow lowerer activity (Affdex) showed no response. During the entire measurement interval, anger activity and brow lowerer activity (Affdex) did not correlate with corrugator muscle activity (EMG). Using Affdex, the facial mimicry response to a joy stimulus can be measured, but it is detected approximately 800 ms later compared to the EMG. Thus, electromyography remains the tool of choice for studying subtle mimic processes like facial mimicry.

Treatment Approaches for Altered Facial Expression: A Systematic Review in Facioscapulohumeral Muscular Dystrophy and Other Neurological Diseases

Background

Facial weakness is a key feature of facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD) and may lead to altered facial expression and subsequent psychosocial impairment. There is no cure and supportive treatments focus on optimizing physical fitness and compensation of functional disabilities.

Objective

We hypothesize that symptomatic treatment options and psychosocial interventions for other neurological diseases with altered facial expression could be applicable to FSHD. Therefore, the aim of this review is to collect symptomatic treatment approaches that target facial muscle function and psychosocial interventions in various neurological diseases with altered facial expression in order to discuss the applicability to FSHD.

Methods

A systematic search was performed. Selected studies had to include FSHD, Bell's palsy, Moebius syndrome, myotonic dystrophy type 1, or Parkinson's disease and treatment options which target altered facial expression. Data was extracted for study and patients' characteristics, outcome assessment tools, treatment, outcome of facial expression and or psychosocial functioning.

Results

Forty studies met the inclusion criteria, of which only three studies included FSHD patients exclusively. Most, twenty-one, studies were performed in patients with Bell's palsy. Studies included twelve different therapy categories and results were assessed with different outcomes measures.

Conclusions

Five therapy categories were considered applicable to FSHD: training of (non-verbal) communication compensation strategies, speech training, physical therapy, conference attendance, and smile restoration surgery. Further research is needed to establish the effect of these therapies in FSHD. We recommend to include outcome measures in these studies that cover at least cosmetic, functional, communication, and quality of life domains.

The Neural Mechanisms of Group Membership Effect on Emotional Mimicry: A Multimodal Study Combining Electromyography and Electroencephalography

Emotional mimicry plays a vital role in understanding others' emotions and has been found to be modulated by social contexts, especially group membership. However, the neural mechanisms underlying this modulation remain unclear. We explored whether and how group membership modulated emotional mimicry using a multimodal method combining facial electromyography (fEMG) and electroencephalography (EEG). We instructed participants to passively view dynamic emotional faces (happy vs. angry) of others (in-group vs. out-group) and simultaneously recorded their fEMG and EEG responses. Then, we conducted combined analyses of fEMG-EEG by splitting the EEG trials into two mimicry intensity categories (high-intensity mimicry vs. low-intensity mimicry) according to fEMG activity. The fEMG results confirmed the occurrence of emotional mimicry in the present study but failed to find a group membership effect. However, the EEG results showed that participants mimicked in-group happiness and anger more than out-group. Importantly, this in-group preference involved different neural mechanisms in happiness and anger mimicry. In-group preference for happiness mimicry occurred at multiple neural mechanisms such as N1 (at P7, Pz, and P8), P2 (at Pz and P8), N2 (at P8), and P3 (at P7, Pz, and P8); in-group preference for anger mimicry occurred at P1 (at P7) and P2 (at Pz). Our findings provide new neural evidence for the effect of group membership on emotional mimicry by uncovering the temporal dynamics of this effect.

Why We Gather: A New Look, Empirically Documented, at Émile Durkheim's Theory of Collective Assemblies and Collective Effervescence

For Durkheim, individuals' survival and well-being rest on cultural resources and social belonging that must be revived periodically in collective assemblies. Durkheim's concern was to clarify how these assemblies achieve this revitalization. An intensive examination of primitive religions led him to identify successive levels of engagement experienced by participants and to develop explanatory principles relevant to all types of collective gatherings. Durkheim's conception is widely referred to nowadays. However, the question of its empirical status remains open. We extracted from his text his main statements and translated them into research questions. We then examined each question in relation to current theories and findings. In particular, we relied on the plethora of recent cognitive and social-psychology studies that document conditions of reduced self-other differentiation. Abundant data support that each successive moment of collective assemblies contributes to blurring this differentiation. Ample support also exists that because shared emotions are increasingly amplified in collective context, they can fuel high-intensity experiences. Moreover, recent studies of self-transcendent emotions can account for the self-transformative effects described by Durkheim at the climax of collective assemblies. In conclusion, this century-old model is remarkably supported by recent results, mostly collected in experimental settings.

Facial mimicry is not modulated by dopamine D2/3 and opioid receptor antagonism

RATIONALE

According to theories of embodied cognition, facial mimicry - the spontaneous, low-intensity imitation of a perceived emotional facial expression - is first an automatic motor response, whose accompanying proprioceptive feedback contributes to emotion recognition. Alternative theoretical accounts, however, view facial mimicry as an emotional response to a rewarding stimulus, and/or an affiliative signal, and thus reject the view of an automatic motor copy.

OBJECTIVES

To contribute to this debate and further investigate the neural basis of facial mimicry, as well as its relation to reward processing, we measured facial reactions to dynamic happy and angry faces after pharmacologically manipulating the opioid and dopamine systems - respectively, thought to subserve 'liking' and 'wanting' of rewards.

METHODS

In a placebo-controlled, double-blind experiment, 130 volunteers received in a between-subjects design 50 mg of the opioidergic antagonist naltrexone, 400 mg of the dopaminergic antagonist amisulpride, or placebo.

RESULTS

Clear occurrence of facial mimicry, measured 4 h after drug intake with electromyography (EMG) of the zygomaticus major and corrugator supercilii muscles, was found. However, facial mimicry was not affected by either compound, as shown with both frequentist statistics, and a Bayesian asymptotic regression model.

CONCLUSIONS

This null finding does not support the hypothesis that facial mimicry (of happiness) reflects an emotional response to a rewarding stimulus, leaving open the possibility of facial mimicry being an automatic motor copy. The results are relevant to the discussion about the psychological nature and the neural basis of facial mimicry, although they should be considered preliminary, given the challenges of interpreting null findings when targeting a novel effect of unknown size.

The Spatiotemporal Dynamics of Facial Movements Reveals the Left Side of a Posed Smile

Humans can recombine thousands of different facial expressions. This variability is due to the ability to voluntarily or involuntarily modulate emotional expressions, which, in turn, depends on the existence of two anatomically separate pathways. The Voluntary (VP) and Involuntary (IP) pathways mediate the production of posed and spontaneous facial expressions, respectively, and might also affect the left and right sides of the face differently. This is a neglected aspect in the literature on emotion, where posed expressions instead of genuine expressions are often used as stimuli. Two experiments with different induction methods were specifically designed to investigate the unfolding of spontaneous and posed facial expressions of happiness along the facial vertical axis (left, right) with a high-definition 3-D optoelectronic system. The results showed that spontaneous expressions were distinguished from posed facial movements as revealed by reliable spatial and speed key kinematic patterns in both experiments. Moreover, VP activation produced a lateralization effect: compared with the felt smile, the posed smile involved an initial acceleration of the left corner of the mouth, while an early deceleration of the right corner occurred in the second phase of the movement, after the velocity peak.

Exploring the Influence of Context on Emotional Mimicry and Intention: An Affirmation of the Correction Hypothesis

BACKGROUND

Emotional mimicry, a phenomenon frequently observed in our everyday interactions, is the act of replicating another individual's facial expression. The Emotion Mimicry in Context View and the Correction Hypothesis underscore the critical role of context and intention within emotional mimicry.

METHODS

In two distinct studies, participants were presented with facial expressions of models (happiness and anger) within various contexts (affiliative, distancing, and neutral). Concurrently, we recorded electromyography (EMG) to index emotional mimicry, while participants explicitly rated the models' intentions.

RESULTS

We observed context swiftly influences emotional mimicry within 500 ms, notably when the intentions of contexts are opposing to the intentions of facial expressions, leading to weakened muscle responses and diminished perceived intention. Furthermore, a notable correlation was discovered in the mimicry of angry faces; the more distancing the context, the stronger the corrugator supercilii (CS) muscle activity after context processing.

CONCLUSIONS

First, emotional mimicry should not be simply viewed as an output corresponding to the expresser's facial expressions but the dynamic process involving the active participation of the observer. Second, intention serves as a pivotal anchor, effectively integrating facial and contextual information. As such, we provided empirical support for the Correction Hypothesis.

Control over emotional facial expressions: Evidence from facial EMG and ERPs in a Stroop-like task

Facial expressions carry important social signals that must be precisely regulated despite potentially conflicting demands on veridicality, communicative intent, and the social situation. In a sample of 19 participants we investigated the challenges of deliberately controlling two facial expressions (smiles and frowns) by the emotional congruency with the expressions of adult and infant counterparts. In a Stroop-like task requiring participants' deliberate expressions of anger or happiness, we investigated the impact of task-irrelevant background pictures of adults and infants showing negative, neutral, or positive facial expressions. Participants' deliberate expressions were measured with electromyogram (EMG) of the M. zygomaticus major and M. corrugator supercilii. The latencies of EMG onsets revealed similar congruency effects for smiles and frowns with significant facilitation and inhibition components relative to the neutral condition. Interestingly, the facilitation effect for frown responses by negative facial expressions was significantly smaller vis a vis infant as compared to adult background faces. This diminished facilitation of frowns by infant's expressions of distress may relate to the activation of caregiver behavior or empathy. We investigated the neural correlates of the observed performance effects by recording event-related-potentials (ERPs). Increased amplitudes in ERP components were observed in incongruent relative to neutral conditions, revealing interference effects on both types of deliberate facial expressions, at different processing stages, namely, structural facial encoding (N170), conflict monitoring (N2), to semantic analysis (N400).

Communicating with ethnic minorities during COVID-19: An experimental test of the effect of self-, ingroup-, and intergroup-focused messages

Developing messaging to encourage minorities to adhere to health recommendations has been a complex task for governments worldwide during the COVID-19 crisis. Here, we propose and tests a new typology of messages among minorities that can be used to mobilize compliance and engagement. This typology comprises three messaging treatments emphasizing personal, ingroup, and intergroup benefits. We examine, via an experimental field study, whether there is a difference in the effect of these messages on two policy outcomes, social distancing and vaccine hesitancy, among the Arab minority living in Israel. The findings suggest that social messages, i.e., ingroup and intergroup messages, positively affect social distancing, while self-messaging harms social distancing compliance. Regarding vaccine intake, within the social messages tested, intergroup-focused messages were more effective than ingroup-focused messages for vaccination intentions only among citizens with low trust in the government. We discuss the findings in detail and propose new avenues in theory and practice to foster health policy compliance among minorities.

Horses (Equus caballus) facial micro-expressions: insight into discreet social information

Facial micro-expressions are facial expressions expressed briefly (less than 500 ms) and involuntarily. Described only in humans, we investigated whether micro-expressions could also be expressed by non-human animal species. Using the Equine Facial action coding system (EquiFACS), an objective tool based on facial muscles actions, we demonstrated that a non-human species, Equus caballus, is expressing facial micro-expressions in a social context. The AU17, AD38 and AD1 were selectively modulated as micro-expression-but not as standard facial expression (all durations included)-in presence of a human experimenter. As standard facial expressions, they have been associated with pain or stress but our results didn't support this association for micro-expressions which may convey other information. Like in humans, neural mechanisms underlying the exhibit of micro-expressions may differ from those of standard facial expressions. We found that some micro-expressions could be related to attention and involved in the multisensory processing of the 'fixed attention' observed in horses' high attentional state. The micro-expressions could be used by horses as social information in an interspecies relationship. We hypothesize that facial micro-expressions could be a window on transient internal states of the animal and may provide subtle and discreet social signals.

Designing a neuroclinical assessment of empathy deficits in psychopathy based on the Zipper Model of Empathy

Ho, M.H., Kemp, B.T., Eisenbarth, H. & Rijnders, R.J.P. Designing a neuroclinical assessment of empathy deficits in psychopathy based on the Zipper Model of Empathy. NEUROSCI BIOBEHAV REV YY(Y) XXX-XXX, 2023. The heterogeneity of the literature on empathy highlights its multidimensional and dynamic nature and affects unclear descriptions of empathy in the context of psychopathology. The Zipper Model of Empathy integrates current theories of empathy and proposes that empathy maturity is dependent on whether contextual and personal factors push affective and cognitive processes together or apart. This concept paper therefore proposes a comprehensive battery of physiological and behavioral measures to empirically assess empathy processing according to this model with an application for psychopathic personality. We propose using the following measures to assess each component of this model: (1) facial electromyography; (2) the Emotion Recognition Task; (3) the Empathy Accuracy task and physiological measures (e.g., heart rate); (4) a selection of Theory of Mind tasks and an adapted Dot Perspective Task, and; (5) an adjusted Charity Task. Ultimately, we hope this paper serves as a starting point for discussion and debate on defining and assessing empathy processing, to encourage research to falsify and update this model to improve our understanding of empathy.

Whose emotion is it? Perspective matters to understand brain-body interactions in emotions

Feeling happy, or judging whether someone else is feeling happy are two distinct facets of emotions that nevertheless rely on similar physiological and neural activity. Differentiating between these two states, also called Self/Other distinction, is an essential aspect of empathy, but how exactly is it implemented? In non-emotional cognition, the transient neural response evoked at each heartbeat, or heartbeat evoked response (HER), indexes the self and signals Self/Other distinction. Here, using electroencephalography (n = 32), we probe whether HERs' role in Self/Other distinction extends also to emotion - a domain where brain-body interactions are particularly relevant. We asked participants to rate independently validated affective scenes, reporting either their own emotion (Self) or the emotion expressed by people in the scene (Other). During the visual cue indicating to adopt the Self or Other perspective, before the affective scene, HERs distinguished between the two conditions, in visual cortices as well as in the right frontal operculum. Physiological reactivity (facial electromyogram, skin conductance, heart rate) during affective scene co-varied as expected with valence and arousal ratings, but also with the Self- or Other- perspective adopted. Finally, HERs contributed to the subjective experience of valence in the Self condition, in addition to and independently from physiological reactivity. We thus show that HERs represent a trans-domain marker of Self/Other distinction, here specifically contributing to experienced valence. We propose that HERs represent a form of evidence related to the 'I' part of the judgement 'To which extent do I feel happy'. The 'I' related evidence would be combined with the affective evidence collected during affective scene presentation, accounting at least partly for the difference between feeling an emotion and identifying it in someone else.

Deep learning reveals what vocal bursts express in different cultures

Human social life is rich with sighs, chuckles, shrieks and other emotional vocalizations, called 'vocal bursts'. Nevertheless, the meaning of vocal bursts across cultures is only beginning to be understood. Here, we combined large-scale experimental data collection with deep learning to reveal the shared and culture-specific meanings of vocal bursts. A total of n = 4,031 participants in China, India, South Africa, the USA and Venezuela mimicked vocal bursts drawn from 2,756 seed recordings. Participants also judged the emotional meaning of each vocal burst. A deep neural network tasked with predicting the culture-specific meanings people attributed to vocal bursts while disregarding context and speaker identity discovered 24 acoustic dimensions, or kinds, of vocal expression with distinct emotion-related meanings. The meanings attributed to these complex vocal modulations were 79% preserved across the five countries and three languages. These results reveal the underlying dimensions of human emotional vocalization in remarkable detail.

Recognition of Emotion from Verbal and Nonverbal Expressions and Its Relation to Effective Communication: A Preliminary Evidence of a Positive Link

Previous work has shown that emotion recognition is positively related to effective social interactions, but the mechanism underlying this relationship has remained largely unclear. Here, we examined the possibility that people who understand others' emotions also talk to them using similar language. In the current study participants (N = 106) listened to emotional stories people shared from their own lives. They were later asked to recognize the storytellers' feelings and finally provide written support messages. Perceivers' ability to accurately recognize others' feelings was assessed using the Emotional Accuracy Test (EAT), which uses naturalistic verbal and nonverbal emotional cues, and using two standard tests of nonverbal emotion recognition (GERT, RMET). The language of the expressor (target) was compared to the language of the supporter (participant) to quantify Language Style Matching, a proxy for effective communication. People who perform better in emotion recognition with verbal cues (EAT) also communicate their understanding and support using language similar to the expresser (r = .22, p = .02). This relation was insignificant for tests without verbal information (RMET, GERT). The result provides additional construct validation for the EAT and supports the view that understanding the emotions of others and communicating with them are two manifestations of a broader interpersonal skill.

An ingroup disadvantage in recognizing micro-expressions

Micro-expression is a fleeting facial expression of emotion that usually occurs in high-stake situations and reveals the true emotion that a person tries to conceal. Due to its unique nature, recognizing micro-expression has great applications for fields like law enforcement, medical treatment, and national security. However, the psychological mechanism of micro-expression recognition is still poorly understood. In the present research, we sought to expand upon previous research to investigate whether the group membership of the expresser influences the recognition process of micro-expressions. By conducting two behavioral studies, we found that contrary to the widespread ingroup advantage found in macro-expression recognition, there was a robust ingroup disadvantage in micro-expression recognition instead. Specifically, in Study 1A and 1B, we found that participants were more accurate at recognizing the intense and subtle micro-expressions of their racial outgroups than those micro-expressions of their racial ingroups, and neither the training experience nor the duration of micro-expressions moderated this ingroup disadvantage. In Study 2A and 2B, we further found that mere social categorization alone was sufficient to elicit the ingroup disadvantage for the recognition of intense and subtle micro-expressions, and such an effect was also unaffected by the duration of micro-expressions. These results suggest that individuals spontaneously employ the social category information of others to recognize micro-expressions, and the ingroup disadvantage in micro-expression stems partly from motivated differential processing of ingroup micro-expressions.

Restricting movements of lower face leaves recognition of emotional vocalizations intact but introduces a valence positivity bias

Blocking facial mimicry can disrupt recognition of emotion stimuli. Many previous studies have focused on facial expressions, and it remains unclear whether this generalises to other types of emotional expressions. Furthermore, by emphasizing categorical recognition judgments, previous studies neglected the role of mimicry in other processing stages, including dimensional (valence and arousal) evaluations. In the study presented herein, we addressed both issues by asking participants to listen to brief non-verbal vocalizations of four emotion categories (anger, disgust, fear, happiness) and neutral sounds under two conditions. One of the conditions included blocking facial mimicry by creating constant tension on the lower face muscles, in the other condition facial muscles remained relaxed. After each stimulus presentation, participants evaluated sounds' category, valence, and arousal. Although the blocking manipulation did not influence emotion recognition, it led to higher valence ratings in a non-category-specific manner, including neutral sounds. Our findings suggest that somatosensory and motor feedback play a role in the evaluation of affect vocalizations, perhaps introducing a directional bias. This distinction between stimulus recognition, stimulus categorization, and stimulus evaluation is important for understanding what cognitive and emotional processing stages involve somatosensory and motor processes.

Nonverbal Synchrony in Technology-Mediated Interviews: A Cross-Cultural Study

Technology-mediated communication has changed the way we interact. Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, this trend became even more pronounced. Media interviews are no exception. Yet, studies on nonverbal behaviors, especially nonverbal synchrony during such mediated settings, have been scarce. To fill the research gap, this study investigated synchronized patterns between interview hosts’ and guests’ facial emotional displays and upper body movement during mediated interviews recorded in the countries in Western (mainly the US, with the addition of the UK) and Eastern cultures (Japan). The interviews were categorized into information- or entertainment-driven interviews, depending on the social attributes of the guest. The time series of the valence in facial displays and upper body movement was automatedly measured using FaceReader and Motion Energy Analysis software, respectively, which was analyzed in terms of simultaneous movements, a primary component of synchrony. As predicted, facial synchrony was more prevalent in information-driven interviews, supporting the motivational and strategic account of synchrony. In addition, female-hosted interviews had a higher degree of synchrony, especially in information-driven interviews. Similar patterns were seen in movement synchrony, although not significant. This study is the first evidence of synchrony in technology-mediated interviews in which a host and a guest appear on split-screen to inform or entertain audiences. However, no cultural differences in synchrony were observed. Situational demands in front of the interactants and the goal-driven nature of communication seemed to play a more prominent role than cultural differences in nonverbal synchrony.

Emotional mimicry as social regulator: theoretical considerations

The goal of this article is to discuss theoretical arguments concerning the idea that emotional mimicry is an intrinsic part of our social being and thus can be considered a social act. For this, we will first present the theoretical assumptions underlying the Emotional Mimicry as Social Regulator view. We then provide a brief overview of recent developments in emotional mimicry research and specifically discuss new developments regarding the role of emotional mimicry in actual interactions and relationships, and individual differences in emotional mimicry. We conclude with open questions for future research.

Deliberate control over facial expressions in motherhood. Evidence from a Stroop-like task

The deliberate control of facial expressions is an important ability in human interactions, in particular for mothers with prelinguistic infants. Because research on this topic is still scarce, we investigated the control over facial expressions in a Stroop-like paradigm. Mothers of 2-6 months old infants and nullipara women produced smiles and frowns in response to verbal commands written on distractor faces of adults or infants showing expressions of happiness or anger/distress. Analyses of video recordings with a machine classifier for facial expression revealed pronounced effects of congruency between the expressions required by the participants and those displayed by the face stimuli on the onset latencies of the deliberate facial expressions. With adult distractor faces this Stroop effect was similar whether participants smiled or frowned. With infant distractor faces mothers and non-mothers showed indistinguishable Stroop effects on smile responses; however, for frown responses, the Stroop effect in mothers was smaller than in non-mothers. We suggest that for frown responses in mothers when facing infants, the effect of mimicry or stimulus response compatibility, leading to the Stroop effect, is offset by a caregiving response or empathy.

How emotions, relationships, and culture constitute each other: advances in social functionalist theory

Social Functionalist Theory (SFT) emerged 20 years ago to orient emotion science to the social nature of emotion. Here we expand upon SFT and make the case for how emotions, relationships, and culture constitute one another. First, we posit that emotions enable the individual to meet six "relational needs" within social interactions: security, commitment, status, trust, fairness, and belongingness. Building upon this new theorising, we detail four principles concerning emotional experience, cognition, expression, and the cultural archiving of emotion. We conclude by considering the bidirectional influences between culture, relationships, and emotion, outlining areas of future inquiry.

Computational Process of Sharing Emotion: An Authentic Information Perspective

Although results of many psychology studies have shown that sharing emotion achieves dyadic interaction, no report has explained a study of the transmission of authentic information from emotional expressions that can strengthen perceivers. For this study, we used computational modeling, which is a multinomial processing tree, for formal quantification of the process of sharing emotion that emphasizes the perception of authentic information for expressers’ feeling states from facial expressions. Results indicated that the ability to perceive authentic information of feeling states from a happy expression has a higher probability than the probability of judging authentic information from anger expressions. Next, happy facial expressions can activate both emotional elicitation and sharing emotion in perceivers, where emotional elicitation alone is working rather than sharing emotion for angry facial expressions. Third, parameters to detect anger experiences were found to be correlated positively with those of happiness. No robust correlation was found between the parameters extracted from this experiment task and questionnaire-measured emotional contagion, empathy, and social anxiety. Results of this study revealed the possibility that a new computational approach contributes to description of emotion sharing processes.

Effects of Social Context on Deliberate Facial Expressions: Evidence from a Stroop-like Task

Facial expressions contribute to nonverbal communication, social coordination, and interaction. Facial expressions may reflect the emotional state of the expressor, but they may be modulated by the presence of others, for example, by facial mimicry or through social display rules. We examined how deliberate facial expressions of happiness and anger (smiles and frowns), prompted by written commands, are modulated by the congruency with the facial expression of background faces and how this effect depends on the age of the background face (infants vs. adults). Our main interest was whether the quality of the required expression could be influenced by a task-irrelevant background face and its emotional display. Background faces from adults and infants displayed happy, angry, or neutral expressions. To assess the activation pattern of different action units, we used a machine classifier software; the same classifier was used to assess the chronometry of the expression responses. Results indicated slower and less correct performance when an incongruent facial expression was in the background, especially when distractor stimuli showed adult faces. Interestingly, smile responses were more intense in congruent than incongruent conditions. Depending on stimulus age, frown responses were affected in their quality by incongruent (smile) expressions in terms of the additional activation or deactivation of the outer brow raiser (AU2), resulting in a blended expression, somewhat different from the prototypical expression for anger. Together, the present results show qualitative effects on deliberate facial expressions, beyond typical chronometric effects, confirming machine classification of facial expressions as a promising tool for emotion research.

How and Why Could Smiling Influence Physical Health? A Conceptual Review

Smiling has been a topic of interest to psychologists for decades, with a myriad of studies tying this behavior to well-being. Despite this, we know surprisingly little about the nature of the connections between smiling and physical health. We review the literature connecting both naturally occurring smiles and experimentally manipulated smiles to physical health and health-relevant outcomes. This work is discussed in the context of existing affect and health-relevant theoretical models that help explain the connection between smiling and physical health including the facial feedback hypothesis, the undoing hypothesis, the generalized unsafety theory of stress, and polyvagal theory. We also describe a number of plausible pathways, some new and relatively untested, through which smiling may influence physical health such as trait or state positive affect, social relationships, stress buffering, and the oculocardiac reflex. Finally, we provide a discussion of possible future directions, including the importance of cultural variation and replication. Although this field is still in its infancy, the findings from both naturally occurring smile studies and experimentally manipulated smile studies consistently suggest that smiling may have a number of health-relevant benefits including beneficially impacting our physiology during acute stress, improved stress recovery, and reduced illness over time.

Bridging the empathy gap: or not? Reactions to ingroup and outgroup facial expressions

Prior research suggests that group membership impacts behavioral and self-reported responses to others’ facial expressions of emotion. In this paper, we examine how the mere labelling of a face as an ingroup or outgroup member affects facial mimicry (Study 1) and judgments of genuineness (Study 2). In addition, we test whether the effects of group membership on facial mimicry and perceived genuineness are moderated by the presence of tears (Study 1) and the motivation to cooperate (Study 2). Results from both studies revealed group-specific biases in facial mimicry and judgments of genuineness. However, introducing cooperative goals abolished differences in judgments of genuineness of facial expressions displayed by ingroup and outgroup members. Together, the findings provide insights into how intergroup biases in emotion perception operate and how they can be reduced by introducing cooperative goals.

Monitoring the effect of oxytocin on the neural sensitivity to emotional faces via frequency-tagging EEG: A double-blind, cross-over study

The neuropeptide oxytocin (OXT) is suggested to exert an important role in human social behaviors by modulating the salience of social cues. To date, however, there is mixed evidence whether a single dose of OXT can improve the behavioral and neural sensitivity for emotional face processing. To overcome difficulties encountered with classic event-related potential studies assessing stimulus-saliency, we applied frequency-tagging EEG to implicitly assess the effect of a single dose of OXT (24 IU) on the neural sensitivity for positive and negative facial emotions. Neutral faces with different identities were presented at 6 Hz, periodically interleaved with an expressive face (angry, fearful, and happy, in separate sequences) every fifth image (i.e., 1.2 Hz oddball frequency). These distinctive frequency tags for neutral and expressive stimuli allowed direct and objective quantification of the neural expression-categorization responses. The study involved a double-blind, placebo-controlled, cross-over trial with 31 healthy adult men. Contrary to our expectations, we did not find an effect of OXT on facial emotion processing, neither at the neural, nor at the behavioral level. A single dose of OXT did not evoke social enhancement in general, nor did it affect social approach-avoidance tendencies. Possibly ceiling performances in facial emotion processing might have hampered further improvement.

The Effect of Facial Self-Resemblance on Emotional Mimicry

Social resemblance, like group membership or similar attitudes, increases the mimicry of the observed emotional facial display. In this study, we investigate whether facial self-resemblance (manipulated by computer morphing) modulates emotional mimicry in a similar manner. Participants watched dynamic expressions of faces that either did or did not resemble their own, while their facial muscle activity was measured using EMG. Additionally, after each presentation, respondents completed social evaluations of the faces they saw. The results show that self-resemblance evokes convergent facial reactions. More specifically, participants mimicked the happiness and, to a lesser extent, the anger of self-resembling faces. In turn, the happiness of non-resembling faces was less likely mimicked than in the case of self-resembling faces, while anger evoked a more divergent, smile-like response. Finally, we found that social evaluations were in general increased by happiness displays, but not influenced by resemblance. Overall, the study demonstrates an interesting and novel phenomenon, particularly that mimicry can be modified by relatively subtle cues of physical resemblance.

Influence of bodily resonances on emotional prosody perception

Introduction

Emotional prosody is defined as suprasegmental and segmental changes in the human voice and related acoustic parameters that can inform the listener about the emotional state of the speaker. While the processing of emotional prosody is well represented in the literature, the mechanism of embodied cognition in emotional voice perception is very little studied. This study aimed to investigate the influence of induced bodily vibrations-through a vibrator placed close to the vocal cords-in the perception of emotional vocalizations. The main hypothesis was that induced body vibrations would constitute a potential interoceptive feedback that can influence the auditory perception of emotions. It was also expected that these effects would be greater for stimuli that are more ambiguous.

Methods

Participants were presented with emotional vocalizations expressing joy or anger which varied from low-intensity vocalizations, considered as ambiguous, to high-intensity ones, considered as non-ambiguous. Vibrations were induced simultaneously in half of the trials and expressed joy or anger congruently with the voice stimuli. Participants had to evaluate each voice stimulus using four visual analog scales (joy, anger, and surprise, sadness as control scales).

Results

A significant effect of the vibrations was observed on the three behavioral indexes-discrimination, confusion and accuracy-with vibrations confusing rather than facilitating vocal emotion processing.

Conclusion

Over all, this study brings new light on a poorly documented topic, namely the potential use of vocal cords vibrations as an interoceptive feedback allowing humans to modulate voice production and perception during social interactions.

Differential beta desynchronisation responses to dynamic emotional facial expressions are attenuated in higher trait anxiety and autism

Daily life demands that we differentiate between a multitude of emotional facial expressions (EFEs). The mirror neuron system (MNS) is becoming increasingly implicated as a neural network involved with understanding emotional body expressions. However, the specificity of the MNS's involvement in emotion recognition has remained largely unexplored. This study investigated whether six basic dynamic EFEs (anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, and surprise) would be differentiated through event-related desynchronisation (ERD) of sensorimotor alpha and beta oscillatory activity, which indexes sensorimotor MNS activity. We found that beta ERD differentiated happy, fearful, and sad dynamic EFEs at the central region of interest, but not at occipital regions. Happy EFEs elicited significantly greater central beta ERD relative to fearful and sad EFEs within 800 - 2,000 ms after EFE onset. These differences were source-localised to the primary somatosensory cortex, which suggests they are likely to reflect differential sensorimotor simulation rather than differential attentional engagement. Furthermore, individuals with higher trait anxiety showed less beta ERD differentiation between happy and sad faces. Similarly, individuals with higher trait autism showed less beta ERD differentiation between happy and fearful faces. These findings suggest that the differential simulation of specific affective states is attenuated in individuals with higher trait anxiety and autism. In summary, the MNS appears to support the skills needed for emotion processing in daily life, which may be influenced by certain individual differences. This provides novel evidence for the notion that simulation-based emotional skills may underlie the emotional difficulties that accompany affective disorders, such as anxiety.

Light makeup decreases receivers' negative emotional experience

Makeup is widely used in modern society and has a positive effect on perceived attractiveness. However, little is known about the other possible outcomes of makeup use. In this study, we investigated whether makeup enhances a receiver's emotional experience. Dynamic faces with or without makeup are presented in Experiments 1 and 2. Participants were asked to imagine themselves video chatting with a target person (expresser) with different expressions: neutral, angry, sad, or happy, and then to appraise their own subjective emotional experience. Emotional valence, arousal, and willingness to communicate were also assessed in Experiment 2. The results showed that makeup improved perceived facial attractiveness and increased the willingness to communicate. More importantly, it revealed that wearing makeup could weaken receivers' negative experiences arising from the angry and sad conditions, which is not the case for the non-makeup condition, but could not affect the happy contagion. Furthermore, incremental changes in the amount of makeup were not accompanied by incremental changes in emotional appraisal (valence and arousal). Overall, we found that makeup may affect emotional contagion and interpersonal communication. Whether the alleviated negative experience due to makeup is adaptive may need further discussion.

Does the Goal Matter? Emotion Recognition Tasks Can Change the Social Value of Facial Mimicry Towards Artificial Agents

In this paper, we present a study aimed at understanding whether the embodiment and humanlikeness of an artificial agent can affect people's spontaneous and instructed mimicry of its facial expressions. The study followed a mixed experimental design and revolved around an emotion recognition task. Participants were randomly assigned to one level of humanlikeness (between-subject variable: humanlike, characterlike, or morph facial texture of the artificial agents) and observed the facial expressions displayed by three artificial agents differing in embodiment (within-subject variable: video-recorded robot, physical robot, and virtual agent) and a human (control). To study both spontaneous and instructed facial mimicry, we divided the experimental sessions into two phases. In the first phase, we asked participants to observe and recognize the emotions displayed by the agents. In the second phase, we asked them to look at the agents' facial expressions, replicate their dynamics as closely as possible, and then identify the observed emotions. In both cases, we assessed participants' facial expressions with an automated Action Unit (AU) intensity detector. Contrary to our hypotheses, our results disclose that the agent that was perceived as the least uncanny, and most anthropomorphic, likable, and co-present, was the one spontaneously mimicked the least. Moreover, they show that instructed facial mimicry negatively predicts spontaneous facial mimicry. Further exploratory analyses revealed that spontaneous facial mimicry appeared when participants were less certain of the emotion they recognized. Hence, we postulate that an emotion recognition goal can flip the social value of facial mimicry as it transforms a likable artificial agent into a distractor. Further work is needed to corroborate this hypothesis. Nevertheless, our findings shed light on the functioning of human-agent and human-robot mimicry in emotion recognition tasks and help us to unravel the relationship between facial mimicry, liking, and rapport.

Playing together, laughing together: rapid facial mimicry and social sensitivity in lowland gorillas

In nonhuman animals, the phenomenon of rapid facial mimicry (RFM)—the automatic, involuntary, and rapid (<1 s) replication of others’ facial expressions—has been mainly investigated in the playful domain. In immature lowland gorillas Gorilla gorilla gorilla both play face (PF) and full PF (FPF) are rapidly mimicked between the players. This makes the species suitable to test hypotheses on the factors influencing RFM during play. The observations on 3 captive groups of lowland gorillas (N = 27) revealed that contrary to expectations, the closeness of social bond negatively influenced the occurrence of RFM but it did not affect either RFM latency or its overlapping index (OVERLAP). RFM was affected by the degree of symmetry of play fighting: the more balanced the session, the higher the occurrence of RFM. Players of the same sex class responded faster than players of different sex. These findings suggest that RFM may help synchronizing behaviors of playmates matching in size (same-sex) and promote symmetric playful interactions. “Laughing together” (measured by the RFM OVERLAP) lasted longer when the responder perfectly mirrored the partner expression (PF→PF; FPF→FPF). If PF and FPF convey information on the different play roughness degree, through “laughing together” the players could coordinate their actions and share positive moods and playful intensity. If the perfect congruency in the motor resonance, also known as social sensitivity, can foster a possible emotional dialogue between gorillas remains to be investigated.

Love and Imitation: Facial Mimicry and Relationship Satisfaction in Younger and Older Couples

OBJECTIVE

Social mimicry, the imitation of one's conversation partner, is associated with empathy, liking, and affiliation. Because previous research has mainly focused on young adulthood and zero acquaintances, little is known about age differences in mimicry and its role for romantic relationships.

METHODS

In this study, 37 younger and 41 older couples talked about an ongoing problem faced by one of the partners while being video-recorded. Three independent observers assessed partners' facial mimicry. After the conversation, couples evaluated the quality of their relationship.

RESULTS

Younger couples imitated each other more than older couples. The link between mimicry and relationship quality was mixed. While facial mimicry was not linked to subjective closeness in either younger or older couples, there was a significant positive association between mimicry and relationship satisfaction in young, but not older, couples.

DISCUSSION

Overall, the results suggest that facial mimicry is a social process that becomes less prevalent and might differ in their function as individuals age.

Alexithymia and Facial Mimicry in Response to Infant and Adult Affect-Expressive Faces

Facial mimicry is the automatic tendency to imitate facial expressions of emotions. Alexithymia is associated with a reduced facial mimicry ability to affect expressions of adults. There is evidence that the baby schema may influence this process. In this study it was tested experimentally whether facial mimicry of the alexithymic group (AG) is different from the control group (CG) in response to dynamic facial affect expressions of children and adults. A multi-method approach (20-point Toronto Alexithymia Scale and Toronto Structured Interview for Alexithymia) was used for assessing levels of alexithymia. From 3503 initial data sets, two groups of 38 high and low alexithymic individuals without relevant mental or physical diseases were matched regarding age, gender, and education. Facial mimicry was induced by presentation of naturalistic affect-expressive video sequences (fear, sadness, disgust, anger, and joy) taken from validated sets of faces from adults (Averaged Karolinska Directed Emotional Faces) and children (Picture-Set of Young Children's Affective Facial Expressions). The videos started with a neutral face and reached maximum affect expression within 2 s. The responses of the groups were measured by facial electromyographic activity (fEMG) of corrugator supercilii and zygomaticus major muscles. Differences in fEMG response (4000 ms) were tested in a variance analytical model. There was one significant main effect for the factor emotion and four interaction effects for the factors group × age, muscle × age, muscle × emotion, and for the triple interaction muscle × age × emotion. The participants of AG showed a decreased fEMG activity in response to the presented faces of adults compared to the CG but not for the faces of children. The affect-expressive faces of children induced enhanced zygomatic and reduced corrugator muscle activity in both groups. Despite existing deficits in the facial mimicry of alexithymic persons, affect-expressive faces of children seem to trigger a stronger positive emotional involvement even in the AG.

Emotional Contagion: A Brief Overview and Future Directions

Social interactions can trigger emotional contagion between individuals resulting in behavioral synchrony. Emotional contagion can be a very effective and attractive strategy in communication and advertising, and understanding the mechanisms underlying emotional contagion can help marketers to improve their commercial approaches or develop better ones. The purpose of this study is to review and classify the various methodologies and theoretical approaches on emotional contagion, identify the best practices in this domain, and identify ways of gaging and measuring emotional contagion. The study is based on a mini literature review. We identify different mechanisms and approaches to emotional contagion described in the literature. Emotional contagion can be triggered by facial expressions, indirect human interactions, and/or by observing other people's behavior in direct and indirect interactions. Furthermore, emotional contagion can be triggered physiologically or neurologically by synchronizing with the emotional state of others during human interactions. Regarding the assessment and measurement of emotional contagion, we argue that methods based on neuroscience tools are much more accurate and effective than methods based on traditional research approaches. The study identifies guidelines for research on commercial communication through emotional contagion that can be especially interesting for academia and marketing practitioners. The findings are important for field marketers interested in developing new individualized approaches in their commercial strategies and marketing in general. In addition, the study can become the basis of research that further refines and compares the efficacy of the various techniques and tools involved.

The neuroscience of empathy and compassion in pro-social behavior

Research in the scientific literature increasingly demonstrates that empathy consists of multiple dimensions, and that defining empathy as a single encompassing term may be imprecise. Recent calls have been made for increasing empathy as means to increase pro-social behavior. However, contradictory evidence exists that empathy may reduce pro-social behavior. This debate has sparked confusion around what is empathy, along with the value of empathy in promoting pro-social behavior. This paper will examine recent advances in affective neuroscience to better understand the construct of empathy and its relationship to pro-social behavior. Individuals' responses to affective empathy, seeing the suffering of others can result in personal distress or empathic concern, which may then subsequently affect motivation for pro-social behavior. Current research in affective neuroscience suggests that combining compassion interventions in conjunction with both affective and cognitive empathy offers the most optimal likelihood that individuals will engage in pro-social behavior.

The “Big Two” and socially induced emotions: Agency and communion jointly influence emotional contagion and emotional mimicry

Three studies investigated the effects of two fundamental dimensions of social perception on emotional contagion (i.e., the transfer of emotions between people). Rooting our hypotheses in the Dual Perspective Model of Agency and Communion (Abele and Wojciszke in Adv Exp Soc Psychol 50:198–255, 10.1016/B978-0-12-800284-1.00004-7, 2014), we predicted that agency would strengthen the effects of communion on emotional contagion and emotional mimicry (a process often considered a key mechanism behind emotional contagion). To test this hypothesis, we exposed participants to happy, sad, and angry senders characterized by low vs. high communion and agency. Our results demonstrated that, as expected, the effects of the two dimensions on socially induced emotions were interactive. The strength and direction of these effects, however, were consistent with our predictions only when the senders expressed happiness. When the senders expressed sadness, we found no effects of agency or communion on participants’ emotional responses, whereas for anger a mixed pattern emerged. Overall, our results align with the notion that emotional contagion and mimicry are modulated not only by the senders’ traits but also by the social meaning of the expressed emotion.