Decoding Basic and Non-basic Facial Expressions and Depressive Symptoms in Late Childhood and Adolescence

This study examined the relationship between decoding nonverbal cues and depressive symptoms in a general school population of 606 children and adolescents (9–15 years). The focus was on the perceived intensity of several emotions in both basic and non-basic facial expressions. The perceived intensities of anger and joy in low intensity facial expressions were related to depression. The higher the perceived intensity of anger the more depressed adolescents were, whereas the reversed effect was found for the perception of joy, but only in girls. These results suggest that the development of decoding biases in low intensity facial expressions may be useful for understanding the development of individual and gender differences in depression during adolescence.

Exploring the Role of Working Memory in Dynamic Social Cue Decoding Using Dual Task Methodology

Decoding nonverbal social cues involves skills such as understanding emotions and discerning kin relationships. Social cue decoding has been described as an automatic process which does not tax cognitive resources. However, clinical deficits in social decoding are often interpreted in terms of deficits in attention and working memory. Two experiments are described which used dual task methodology to investigate the role of working memory in dynamic social cue decoding tasks: the Interpersonal Perception Task (IPT, Experiment 1) and the Profile of Nonverbal Sensitivity (PONS, Experiment 2). Results revealed that decoding social cues from the IPT did not require working memory resources, while social perception in the PONS made heavy demands on working memory. Implications for theoretical interpretation of these tasks and their use in clinical populations are discussed.

Enhanced Experience of Emotional Arousal in Response to Dynamic Facial Expressions

In this study, we investigated the emotional effect of dynamic presentation of facial expressions. Dynamic and static facial expressions of negative and positive emotions were presented using computer-morphing (Experiment 1) and videos of natural changes (Experiment 2), as well as other dynamic and static mosaic images. Participants rated the valence and arousal of their emotional response to the stimuli. The participants consistently reported higher arousal responses to dynamic than to static presentation of facial expressions and mosaic images for both valences. Dynamic presentation had no effect on the valence ratings. These results suggest that dynamic presentation of emotional facial expressions enhances the overall emotional experience without a corresponding qualitative change in the experience, although this effect is not specific to facial images.

Moving Faces: Categorization of Dynamic Facial Expressions in American Sign Language by Deaf and Hearing Participants

American Sign Language (ASL) uses the face to express grammar and inflection, in addition to emotion. Research in this area has mostly used photographic stimuli. The purpose of this paper is to present data on how deaf signers and hearing non-signers recognize and categorize a variety of communicative facial expressions in ASL using dynamic stimuli rather than static pictures. Stimuli included six expression types chosen because they share overt similarities but express different content. Hearing participants were more accurate in their categorizations but expressed overall lower confidence regarding their performance.

Comparison of Deliberate and Spontaneous Facial Movement in Smiles and Eyebrow Raises

We investigated movement differences between deliberately posed and spontaneously occurring smiles and eyebrow raises during a videotaped interview that included a facial movement assessment. Using automated facial image analysis, we quantified lip corner and eyebrow movement during periods of visible smiles and eyebrow raises and compared facial movement within participants. As in an earlier study, maximum speed of movement onset was greater in deliberate smiles. Maximum speed and amplitude were greater and duration shorter in deliberate compared to spontaneous eyebrow raises. Asymmetry of movement did not differ within participants. Similar patterns contrasting deliberate and spontaneous movement in both smiles and eyebrow raises suggest a common pattern of signaling for spontaneous facial displays.

Rapid Emotional Contagion and Expressive Congruence Under Strong Test Conditions

The present research examined whether the observation of emotional expressions rapidly induces congruent emotional experiences and facial responses in observers under strong test conditions. Specifically, participants rated their emotional reactions after (a) single, brief exposures of (b) a range of human emotional facial expressions that included (c) a neutral face comparison using a procedure designed to (d) minimize potential experimental demand. Even with these strong test conditions in place, participants reported discrete expression-congruent changes in emotional experience. Participants’ Corrugator supercilii facial muscle activity immediately following the presentation of an emotional expression appeared to reflect expressive congruence with the observed expression and a response indicative of the amount of cognitive load necessary to interpret the observed expression. The complexity of the C. supercilii response suggests caution in using facial muscle activity as a nonverbal measure of emotional contagion.

Effects of Dynamic Attributes of Smiles in Human and Synthetic Faces: A Simulated Job Interview Setting

We examined the effects of the temporal quality of smile displays on impressions and decisions made in a simulated job interview. We also investigated whether similar judgments were made in response to synthetic (Study 1) and human facial stimuli (Study 2). Participants viewed short video excerpts of female interviewees exhibiting dynamic authentic smiles, dynamic fake smiles, or neutral expressions, and rated them with respect to a number of attributes. In both studies, perceivers’ judgments and employment decisions were significantly shaped by the temporal quality of smiles, with dynamic authentic smiles generally leading to more favorable job, person, and expression ratings than dynamic fake smiles or neutral expressions. Furthermore, authentically smiling interviewees were judged to be more suitable and were more likely to be short-listed and selected for the job. The findings show a high degree of correspondence in the effects created by synthetic and human facial stimuli, suggesting that temporal features of smiles similarly influence perceivers’ judgments and decisions across the two types of stimulus.

Reading your Counterpart: The Benefit of Emotion Recognition Accuracy for Effectiveness in Negotiation

Using meta-analysis, we find a consistent positive correlation between emotion recognition accuracy (ERA) and goal-oriented performance. However, this existing research relies primarily on subjective perceptions of performance. The current study tested the impact of ERA on objective performance in a mixed-motive buyer-seller negotiation exercise. Greater recognition of posed facial expressions predicted better objective outcomes for participants from Singapore playing the role of seller, both in terms of creating value and claiming a greater share for themselves. The present study is distinct from past research on the effects of individual differences on negotiation outcomes in that it uses a performance-based test rather than self-reported measure. These results add to evidence for the predictive validity of emotion recognition measures on practical outcomes.

A Cross-species Comparison of Facial Morphology and Movement in Humans and Chimpanzees Using the Facial Action Coding System (FACS)

A comparative perspective has remained central to the study of human facial expressions since Darwin’s [(1872/1998). The expression of the emotions in man and animals (3rd ed.). New York: Oxford University Press] insightful observations on the presence and significance of cross-species continuities and species-unique phenomena. However, cross-species comparisons are often difficult to draw due to methodological limitations. We report the application of a common methodology, the Facial Action Coding System (FACS) to examine facial movement across two species of hominoids, namely humans and chimpanzees. FACS [Ekman & Friesen (1978). Facial action coding system. CA: Consulting Psychology Press] has been employed to identify the repertoire of human facial movements. We demonstrate that FACS can be applied to other species, but highlight that any modifications must be based on both underlying anatomy and detailed observational analysis of movements. Here we describe the ChimpFACS and use it to compare the repertoire of facial movement in chimpanzees and humans. While the underlying mimetic musculature shows minimal differences, important differences in facial morphology impact upon the identification and detection of related surface appearance changes across these two species.

A Historical Perspective on High School Students’ Paid Employment and Its Association with High School Dropout

Discussions about the role of paid employment in high school students’ lives usually involve untested assumptions about historical trends in the frequency, intensity, and selective nature of students’ employment behaviors. Using several nationally representative data sources, we find few changes in rates of employment or hours worked per week among adolescents since 1940 or among students since 1980. We observe important changes in recent decades in racial/ethnic and gender differences in employment and intensive employment. Finally, we observe that the relationship between students’ intensive employment and high school completion has been stable and persistently significant since the late 1960s.

Reduced prizes and increased effort in contests

We study the general class of two-player public-policy contests and specify the asymmetry condition under which a more restrained government intervention that reduces the contestants’ prizes has the “perverse” effect of increasing their aggregate lobbying efforts.

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The scoring rules in an endogenous election

Plurality rule is mostly criticized from being capable of choosing an alternative considered as worst by a strict majority. This paper considers elections in which the agenda consists of potential candidates strategically choosing whether or not to enter the election. In this context, we examine the ability of scoring rules to fulfil the Condorcet criterion. We show for the case of three potential candidates that Plurality rule is the only scoring rule that satisfies a version of the Condorcet criterion in two cases: 1) when preferences are single-peaked and, 2) when preferences are single-dipped.

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On the influence of extreme parties in electoral competition with policy-motivated candidates

We study and compare equilibrium platforms in models of unidimensional electoral competition with two and four policy motivated parties. We first analyze the plurality game, where the party getting the most votes is elected and implements its proposed platform. Restrictions on the set of credible announcements are needed to get existence of equilibria. Comparing equilibria with two and four parties, we obtain that moderate parties react to the introduction of extreme parties by proposing the same or more extreme equilibrium platforms. We then study the proportional system, where the policy implemented is a weighted sum of the proposals, with the voting shares as weights. Here, the existence of extreme parties leads moderate ones to choose more centrist platforms. We finally test the robustness of our results with respect to, first, the enlargement of the strategy space to entry decisions and, second, to asymmetric distributions of voters' blisspoints.

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Do Reservation Wages Really Decline? Some International Evidence on the Determinants of Reservation Wages

Using cross-country data, we investigate the determinants of reservation wages and their course over the jobless spell. Higher unemployment benefits lead to higher reservation wages. Further, again consistent with the basic search model, repeated observations on the same individual provide scant evidence of declining reservation wages.

Different Paths to Similar Outcomes? Industrial Relations Reform and Public Policy in Australia and New Zealand

In recent years, both Australia and New Zealand have embarked on significant labor market reforms which have resulted in more decentralized and individualized systems of industrial relations. Although both countries share a common heritage of state-sponsored conciliation and arbitration, which fostered a centralized approach to labor market regulation, each has responded in its own way to economic and political pressures to reform its long-established industrial relations system. Despite differences in the process of indusrial relations reform, both countries now have industrial relations systems which are more individualistic and in which unions play a less significant role than in the past.

Parents’ Beliefs about Emotions and Children’s Recognition of Parents’ Emotions

This study investigated parents’ emotion-related beliefs, experience, and expression, and children’s recognition of their parents’ emotions with 40 parent-child dyads. Parents reported beliefs about danger and guidance of children’s emotions. While viewing emotion-eliciting film clips, parents self-reported their emotional experience and masking of emotion. Children and observers rated videos of parents watching emotion-eliciting film clips. Fathers reported more masking than mothers and their emotional expressions were more difficult for both observers and children to recognize compared with mothers’ emotional expressions. For fathers, but not mothers, showing clearer expressions was related to children’s general skill at recognizing emotional expressions. Parents who believe emotions are dangerous reported greater masking of emotional expression. Contrary to hypothesis, when parents strongly believe in guiding their child’s emotion socialization, children showed less accurate recognition of their parents’ emotions.

Effective Adolescent Substance Abuse Treatment in Juvenile Justice Settings: Practice and Policy Recommendations

Juvenile justice—increasingly the service delivery point for adolescents with substance abuse and co-occurring problems lacking resources for other assistance—can be a model for improved and expanded, yet cost-effective, adolescent substance abuse treatment. An emergent standard of care challenges systemic inequities; a new service array facilitates dialogue among justice and treatment professionals, families, and the youth themselves. Such evidence-based practice—and the policy to implement it—have the power to transform disconnected laws, programs and professionals into an effective, efficient and successful community of responders, helping youth reclaim their lives while improving public health and public safety.

Chinese Contract Law and the Economic Reform

China’s previous contract laws had many contradictions and failed to meet the needs of China’s developing market economy. Although some problems still need to be dealt with, the unified contract law is more advanced, systematic and plays an important role in fostering and encouraging transactions.

Recall of Nonverbal Cues: Exploring a New Definition of Interpersonal Sensitivity

Interpersonal sensitivity, defined as the accurate recall of another person’s nonverbal behavior, was measured in two studies. In Study 1, nonverbal recall accuracy (NRA) was based on recall of cues expressed by a man and/or woman being interviewed on videotape. Retest reliability after 2 weeks was satisfactory and the male and female tests demonstrated sufficient convergence. Participants could assess their own recall accuracy at better than chance levels; ability to decode the meanings of visual nonverbal cues was positively related to NRA; discriminant validity of NRA was demonstrated with regard to general cognitive ability; and women had higher NRA than men. In Study 2, NRA was based on recall of a live interaction partner. Women again had higher NRA than men; NRA was significantly better than chance; and higher NRA was associated with more smiling and self-reported positive affect during the interaction. Nonverbal recall accuracy is a promising new definition of interpersonal sensitivity.