title: Are Happy Faces Attractive? The Roles of Early vs. Late Processing.
abstract: Facial attractiveness is closely related to romantic love. To understand if the neural underpinnings of perceived facial attractiveness and facial expression are similar constructs, we recorded neural signals using an event-related potential (ERP) methodology for 20 participants who were viewing faces with varied attractiveness and expressions. We found that attractiveness and expression were reflected by two early components, P2-lateral (P2l) and P2-medial (P2m), respectively; their interaction effect was reflected by LPP, a late component. The findings suggested that facial attractiveness and expression are first processed in parallel for discrimination between stimuli. After the initial processing, more attentional resources are allocated to the faces with the most positive or most negative valence in both the attractiveness and expression dimensions. The findings contribute to the theoretical model of face perception.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Neuropsychology, The University of Hong Kong Hong Kong, China.
authors.forename: Delin
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Sun
authors.affiliation: Applied Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University Hong Kong, China.
authors.forename: Chetwyn C H
authors.initials: CC
authors.lastname: Chan
authors.affiliation: Department of Fiber Science and Apparel Design, Connell University New York, NY, USA.
authors.forename: Jintu
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Fan
authors.affiliation: Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, Huashan Hospital, Fudan University Shanghai, China.
authors.forename: Yi
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Neuropsychology, The University of Hong Kong Hong Kong, China ; Institute of Clinical Neuropsychology, The University of Hong Kong Hong Kong, China.
authors.forename: Tatia M C
authors.initials: TM
authors.lastname: Lee
keywords: ERP; LPP; P2; attractiveness; expression; face