Sorry, Not Sorry: Effects of Different Types of Apologies and Self-Monitoring on Non-verbal Behaviors.

This study examines the effects of different types of apologies and individual differences in self-monitoring on non-verbal apology behaviors involving a server apologizing to a customer. Apologies divide into sincere apologies that reflect genuine recognition of fault, and instrumental apologies, made for achieving a personal goal such as avoiding punishment or rejection by others. Self-monitoring (public-performing and other-directedness) were also examined. Fifty-three female undergraduate students participated in the experiment. Participants were assigned randomly to either a sincere apology condition or an instrumental apology condition. They watched the film clip of the communication between a customer and server and then role-played how they would apologize if they were the server. Participants' non-verbal behavior during the role-play was videotaped. The results showed an interaction between the apology condition and self-monitoring on non-verbal behaviors. When public-performing was low, gaze avoidance was more likely to occur with a sincere apology than an instrumental apology. There was no difference when the public-performing was high. Facial displays of apology were apparent in the instrumental apology compared to the sincere apology. This tendency became more conspicuous with increased public-performing. Our results indicated that the higher the public-performing, the more participants tried to convey the feeling of apology by combining a direct gaze and facial displays in an instrumental apology. On the other hand, results suggest that lower levels of public-performing elicited less immediacy in offering a sincere apology. Further studies are needed to determine whether these results apply to other conflict resolution situations.

Personal Nonverbal Repertoires in facial displays and their relation to individual differences in social and emotional styles.

ABSTRACTResearch on individual differences in the occurrence of relatively frequent facial displays is scarce. We examined whether (1) individuals' spontaneous facial expressions show a relatively frequent pattern of AUs (referred to as Personal Nonverbal Repertoires or PNRs), and (2) whether these patterns are associated with self-reported social and emotional styles. We videotaped 110 individuals during 10 minutes in 2 different contexts and manually FACS coded 18 AUs. Subsequently, participants completed questionnaires regarding individual differences in social and emotional styles: BIS/BAS, interpersonal orientation, conflict handling style, and emotion regulation (reliably reduced to 4 factors: Yielding, Forcing, Compromising and Extraversion). We found five patterns of PNRs: Smiling (AU6,12), Partial Blinking, Drooping (AU41, 63), Tensed (AU1 + 2, 4, 7, 23), and Eyes widening (AU5). Three PNRs showed weak to moderate correlations with individual differences in social and emotional styles (based on EFA): Smiling is associated with Compromising and Extraversion, Drooping with Yielding, and Partial Blinking is negatively correlated with Extraversion. These findings suggest that some of an individual's frequent facial action patterns are associated with specific styles in social and emotional interactions.

Effects of being watched on eye gaze and facial displays of typical and autistic individuals during conversation.

LAY ABSTRACT: When we are communicating with other people, we exchange a variety of social signals through eye gaze and facial expressions. However, coordinated exchanges of these social signals can only happen when people involved in the interaction are able to see each other. Although previous studies report that autistic individuals have difficulties in using eye gaze and facial expressions during social interactions, evidence from tasks that involve real face-to-face conversations is scarce and mixed. Here, we investigate how eye gaze and facial expressions of typical and high-functioning autistic individuals are modulated by the belief in being seen by another person, and by being in a face-to-face interaction. Participants were recorded with an eye-tracking and video-camera system while they completed a structured Q&A task with a confederate under three social contexts: pre-recorded video (no belief in being seen, no face-to-face), video-call (belief in being seen, no face-to-face) and face-to-face (belief in being seen and face-to-face). Typical participants gazed less to the confederate and made more facial expressions when they were being watched and when they were speaking. Contrary to our hypotheses, eye gaze and facial expression patterns in autistic participants were overall similar to the typical group. This suggests that high-functioning autistic participants are able to use eye gaze and facial expressions as social signals. Future studies will need to investigate to what extent this reflects spontaneous behaviour or the use of compensation strategies.

Facial and neural mechanisms during interactive disclosure of biographical information.

Pairs of participants mutually communicated (or not) biographical information to each other. By combining simultaneous eye-tracking, face-tracking and functional near-infrared spectroscopy, we examined how this mutual sharing of information modulates social signalling and brain activity. When biographical information was disclosed, participants directed more eye gaze to the face of the partner and presented more facial displays. We also found that spontaneous production and observation of facial displays was associated with activity in the left SMG and right dlPFC/IFG, respectively. Moreover, mutual information-sharing increased activity in bilateral TPJ and left dlPFC, as well as cross-brain synchrony between right TPJ and left dlPFC. This suggests that a complex long-range mechanism is recruited during information-sharing. These multimodal findings support the second-person neuroscience hypothesis, which postulates that communicative interactions activate additional neurocognitive mechanisms to those engaged in non-interactive situations. They further advance our understanding of which neurocognitive mechanisms underlie communicative interactions.

Measuring the evolution of facial 'expression' using multi-species FACS.

Darwin observed that form, and in his view, meaning, of facial behaviour (observable changes in the appearance of the face, often termed facial 'expression') is similar between a wide range of species and concluded that this must be due to a shared ancestral origin. Yet, as with all social behaviours, exactly how to define similarity and determine homology is debated. Facial behaviour is linked to specific facial muscle movements, so one important factor in determining homology is the anatomical basis of facial behaviours that appear similar in both appearance and social function. The Facial Action Coding System (FACS) was developed for the scientific measurement of human facial behaviour and is based on individual facial muscle movements (Ekman and Friesen, 1978). FACS has since been modified for use with various non-human primate species (chimpanzees, macaques, hylobatids, orangutans) and domestic species (dogs, cats, horses). These FACS can be used to trace continuity of form in facial behaviour across species and build a better understanding of the evolution of facial communication in mammals.

Intraspecific Motor and Emotional Alignment in Dogs and Wolves: The Basic Building Blocks of Dog-Human Affective Connectedness.

Involuntary synchronization occurs when individuals perform the same motor action patterns during a very short time lapse. This phenomenon serves an important adaptive value for animals permitting them to socially align with group fellows thus increasing integration and fitness benefits. Rapid mimicry (RM) and yawn contagion (YC) are two behavioral processes intermingled in the animal synchronization domain. Several studies demonstrated that RM and YC are socially modulated being more frequently performed by individuals sharing close relationships. This evidence highlights the relation between RM/YC and emotional contagion that is the capacity of two or more individuals to share the same affective state. In this review, we try to delineate a possible developmental trajectory of emotional sharing phenomena by using, as a model species, the domestic dog (Canis lupus familiaris), a valid example of empathic predisposition towards individuals belonging both to the same and the different species. We contrast available findings on RM and YC in dog-dog and dog-human dyads with those in wolf-wolf dyads, in order to investigate if the ability to emotionally engage with conspecifics (wolf-wolf and dog-dog) is evolutionary rooted in canids and if provides the basis for the development of inter-specific emotional sharing (dog-human).

Smiles, turnout, candidates, and the winning of district seats.

Research has shown that a candidate's appearance affects the support he or she receives in elections. We extend this research in this article in three ways. First, we examine this relationship further in a non-Western context using 2015 local elections in Japan. Next, we show that this positive relationship is more complicated depending on the characteristics of the election under consideration. Specifically, we distinguished election contests by levels of turnout and found that despite a positive relationship between turnout and the extent to which smiling increases a candidate's support levels, the marginal increase in support declined as turnout increased and, in fact, became negative when some high-turnout threshold was crossed. Finally, we show that the number of candidates competing in an election is negatively related to the impact of a candidate smiling, confirming research conducted by the Dartmouth Group.

Facial Displays Are Tools for Social Influence.

Based on modern theories of signal evolution and animal communication, the behavioral ecology view of facial displays (BECV) reconceives our 'facial expressions of emotion' as social tools that serve as lead signs to contingent action in social negotiation. BECV offers an externalist, functionalist view of facial displays that is not bound to Western conceptions about either expressions or emotions. It easily accommodates recent findings of diversity in facial displays, their public context-dependency, and the curious but common occurrence of solitary facial behavior. Finally, BECV restores continuity of human facial behavior research with modern functional accounts of non-human communication, and provides a non-mentalistic account of facial displays well-suited to new developments in artificial intelligence and social robotics.

Strengthening bonds and connecting with followers.

The smiles and affiliative expressions of presidential candidates are important for political success, allowing contenders to nonverbally connect with potential supporters and bond with followers. Smiles, however, are not unitary displays; they are multifaceted in composition and signaling intent due to variations in performance. With this in mind, we examine the composition and perception of smiling behavior by Republican presidential candidates during the 2012 preprimary period. In this paper we review literature concerning different smile types and the muscular movements that compose them from a biobehavioral perspective. We then analyze smiles expressed by Republican presidential candidates early in the 2012 primary season by coding facial muscle activity at the microlevel using the Facial Action Coding System (FACS) to produce an inventory of politically relevant smile types. To validate the subtle observed differences between smile types, we show viewers a series of short video clips to differentiate displays on the basis of their perceived reassurance, or social signaling. The discussion considers the implications of our findings in relation to political evaluation and communication efficacy.

Epistemic motivation affects the processing of negative emotional stimuli in interpersonal decisions.

The present electrophysiological study investigated the role of the need for cognitive closure (NFC) in emotional processing. The NFC is conceptualized as an epistemic motive that is related to how and why people seek out information in social environments. Event-related potentials were recorded while individuals with high NFC (i.e., low epistemic motivation) or low NFC (i.e., high epistemic motivation) performed a modified Ultimatum Game, in which the emotions of happy or angry game agents were employed to predict their most likely offer. High-NFC participants more closely adhered to the decisions rules of the game than low-NFC individuals did. The electrophysiological results showed that the dispositional NFC modified early perceptual components (N170, N200, and P200). The potentials showed that high-NFC subjects had a processing bias to angry faces, whereas low-NFC individuals exhibited no such effects. These findings indicated that high-NFC individuals were more sensitive to negative emotional stimuli than low-NFC individuals in an interpersonal decision-making task.

Orangutans modify facial displays depending on recipient attention.

Primate facial expressions are widely accepted as underpinned by reflexive emotional processes and not under voluntary control. In contrast, other modes of primate communication, especially gestures, are widely accepted as underpinned by intentional, goal-driven cognitive processes. One reason for this distinction is that production of primate gestures is often sensitive to the attentional state of the recipient, a phenomenon used as one of the key behavioural criteria for identifying intentionality in signal production. The reasoning is that modifying/producing a signal when a potential recipient is looking could demonstrate that the sender intends to communicate with them. Here, we show that the production of a primate facial expression can also be sensitive to the attention of the play partner. Using the orangutan (Pongo pygmaeus) Facial Action Coding System (OrangFACS), we demonstrate that facial movements are more intense and more complex when recipient attention is directed towards the sender. Therefore, production of the playface is not an automated response to play (or simply a play behaviour itself) and is instead produced flexibly depending on the context. If sensitivity to attentional stance is a good indicator of intentionality, we must also conclude that the orangutan playface is intentionally produced. However, a number of alternative, lower level interpretations for flexible production of signals in response to the attention of another are discussed. As intentionality is a key feature of human language, claims of intentional communication in related primate species are powerful drivers in language evolution debates, and thus caution in identifying intentionality is important.

Relaxed open mouth as a playful signal in wild ring-tailed lemurs.

Play signals are commonly used by animals to communicate their playful motivation and to limit the risk that rough acts are misunderstood by playmates. The relaxed open mouth is the most common facial expression performed during play in many mammals and represents the ritualized version of the movement anticipating a play bite. The signaling nature of this expression has been proven in many haplorrhine species but never demonstrated in strepsirrhines. Our purpose was assessing whether, also in strepsirrhines, the relaxed open mouth has an actual communicative function. We studied wild ring-tailed lemurs (Lemur catta), characterized by highly social habits including intense playful interactions. They largely use playful signals, mostly performed with the black and white tail. The signaling function of the tail (tail play) has been widely demonstrated. We analyzed both tail play and the relaxed open mouth to verify how their distribution is affected by different play variables (e.g., play session symmetry, number of play mates, previous use of the same pattern). Indeed, ring-tailed lemurs use the relaxed open mouth as a communicative signal during play. Relaxed open mouth was more frequent during unbalanced interactions showing the highest asymmetry in the patterns performed by the two players (offensive/neutral). Compared to tail play, relaxed open mouth was more frequent during dyadic than polyadic interactions and, as a highly directional signal, it was more frequently replicated by the play mate. Therefore, the relaxed open mouth needs to be performed face-to-face so that signal detection can be optimized. Similar to previous findings in monkeys and apes, the relaxed open mouth in lemurs seems to be a ritualized signal used to engage and, perhaps, sustain playful interaction.