Transmitting and decoding facial expressions.
This article examines the human face as a transmitter of expression signals and the brain as a decoder of these expression signals. If the face has evolved to optimize transmission of such signals, the basic facial expressions should have minimal overlap in their information. If the brain has evolved to optimize categorization of expressions, it should be efficient with the information available from the transmitter for the task. In this article, we characterize the information underlying the recognition of the six basic facial expression signals and evaluate how efficiently each expression is decoded by the underlying brain structures.
Smith
Marie L
ML
Department of Psychology, University of Glasgow, 58 Hillhead Street, Glasgow, Scotland G12 0DX, United Kingdom.
Cottrell
Garrison W
GW
Gosselin
Frédéric
F
Schyns
Philippe G
PG
D000328:Adult; D001921:Brain / Q000502:physiology*; D032882:Comprehension / Q000502:physiology; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology*; D005149:Facial Expression; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D008297:Male; D009633:Nonverbal Communication; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology*; D010470:Perceptual Masking / Q000502:physiology*; D013223:Statistics as Topic