Lab of Action & Body, Department of Psychology, Royal Holloway, University of London, London, UK.
Emotion. 2013 Feb;13(1):7-13. doi: 10.1037/a0030884. Epub 2013 Jan 28.
Embodied simulation accounts of emotion recognition claim that we vicariously activate somatosensory representations to simulate, and eventually understand, how others feel. Interestingly, mirror-touch synesthetes, who experience touch when observing others being touched, show both enhanced somatosensory simulation and superior recognition of emotional facial expressions. We employed synchronous visuotactile stimulation to experimentally induce a similar experience of "mirror touch" in nonsynesthetic participants. Seeing someone else's face being touched at the same time as one's own face results in the "enfacement illusion," which has been previously shown to blur self-other boundaries. We demonstrate that the enfacement illusion also facilitates emotion recognition, and, importantly, this facilitatory effect is specific to fearful facial expressions. Shared synchronous multisensory experiences may experimentally facilitate somatosensory simulation mechanisms involved in the recognition of fearful emotional expressions.
具身模拟理论认为，我们通过替代性地激活体感表征来模拟他人的感受，进而理解他人的感受。有趣的是，镜像触摸联觉者在观察他人被触摸时会体验到触摸，他们表现出更强的体感模拟和对情绪面部表情的更好识别。我们使用同步视触刺激在非联觉者中实验性地诱导出类似的“镜像触摸”体验。当一个人的脸和别人的脸同时被触摸时，会产生“脸融合错觉”，此前的研究表明这种错觉会模糊自我与他人之间的边界。我们证明，脸融合错觉也促进了情绪识别，而且，重要的是，这种促进作用仅针对恐惧的面部表情。共享的同步多感觉体验可能会在实验中促进参与识别恐惧情绪表达的体感模拟机制。
