Korb Sebastian, With Stéphane, Niedenthal Paula, Kaiser Susanne, Grandjean Didier
Department of Psychology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, Wisconsin, United States of America.
Department of Psychology, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland.
PLoS One. 2014 Jun 11;9(6):e99194. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0099194. eCollection 2014.
The mechanisms through which people perceive different types of smiles and judge their authenticity remain unclear. Here, 19 different types of smiles were created based on the Facial Action Coding System (FACS), using highly controlled, dynamic avatar faces. Participants observed short videos of smiles while their facial mimicry was measured with electromyography (EMG) over four facial muscles. Smile authenticity was judged after each trial. Avatar attractiveness was judged once in response to each avatar's neutral face. Results suggest that, in contrast to most earlier work using static pictures as stimuli, participants relied less on the Duchenne marker (the presence of crow's feet wrinkles around the eyes) in their judgments of authenticity. Furthermore, mimicry of smiles occurred in the Zygomaticus Major, Orbicularis Oculi, and Corrugator muscles. Consistent with theories of embodied cognition, activity in these muscles predicted authenticity judgments, suggesting that facial mimicry influences the perception of smiles. However, no significant mediation effect of facial mimicry was found. Avatar attractiveness did not predict authenticity judgments or mimicry patterns.
人们感知不同类型微笑并判断其真实性的机制尚不清楚。在此，基于面部动作编码系统（FACS），使用高度可控的动态虚拟头像创建了19种不同类型的微笑。参与者观看微笑短视频，同时通过肌电图（EMG）测量其在四块面部肌肉上的面部模仿情况。每次试验后判断微笑的真实性。针对每个虚拟头像的中性脸，对其吸引力进行一次判断。结果表明，与大多数早期使用静态图片作为刺激的研究不同，参与者在判断真实性时较少依赖杜兴标记（眼睛周围出现鱼尾纹）。此外，颧大肌、眼轮匝肌和皱眉肌出现了对微笑的模仿。与具身认知理论一致，这些肌肉的活动预测了真实性判断，表明面部模仿会影响对微笑的感知。然而，未发现面部模仿有显著的中介效应。虚拟头像的吸引力并未预测真实性判断或模仿模式。
