Basic emotions do not reliably co-occur with predicted facial expressions: Reply to Witkower et al. (2023).

Replies to the comments made by Witkower, et al. (see record 2023-63008-004) on the current authors original article (see record 2022-03375-001). A core assumption of Basic Emotion Theory is that the conscious experience of a basic emotion co-occurs with a facial expression signal of that same emotion. Our analysis of available evidence found co-occurrence in only 13% of cases-thus calling into question basic and applied studies in which the emotion is inferred from the face. Our second analysis counted as a co-occurrence even when only part of the facial signal was observed. Co-occurrence was found in only 23% of cases. Witkower et al.'s rebuttal failed to undermine these important findings. They claimed that similar degrees of correlation are found in other areas of psychology, but they confuse co-occurrence of two intrinsic manifestations of the same event (expression and experience of emotion) with the correlation between one potential causal antecedent and an observed event (e.g., effects of meditation on anxiety). Our results stand as a major challenge to Basic Emotion Theory. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Characteristics of attentional bias in meditators: An ERP study.

Attentional bias is closely related to individual mental health. To explore the effect of mindfulness meditation on attentional bias, we use the dot-probe task to measure and compare the attentional bias of 16 Shaolin monks with meditation experience (meditator group) and 18 ordinary people without meditation experience (control group). The results were as follows: (1) The control group showed attentional bias to anger stimuli, while the meditator group did not show attentional bias; (2) The P1 amplitude induced by emotion stimuli was significantly less in the meditator group than in the control group; (3) When the control group observed angry-neutral faces, the P2 amplitude was greater than when they saw neutral-neutral faces. In comparison, there was no significant difference in P2 amplitude when the meditator group viewed faces with different emotions. This leads us to contend that people highly practiced in meditation can reduce their attentional bias to negative information, and show the cognitive characteristics of "impartial" treatment to external information.

Toward reanimating the laughter-involved large-scale brain networks to alleviate affective symptoms.

INTRODUCTION: The practicality of the idea whether the laughter-involved large-scale brain networks can be stimulated to remediate affective symptoms, namely depression, has remained elusive. METHODS: In this study, 25 healthy individuals were tested through 21-channel quantitative electroencephalography (qEEG) setup upon resting state and while submitted to standardized funny video clips (corated by two behavioral neuroscientists and a verified expert comedian, into neutral and mildly to highly funny). We evaluated the individuals' facial expressions against the valence and intensity of each stimulus through the Nuldos face analysis software. The study also employed an eye-tracking setup to examine fixations, gaze, and saccadic movements upon each task. In addition, changes in polygraphic parameters were monitored upon resting state and exposure to clips using the 4-channel Nexus polygraphy setup. RESULTS: The happy facial expression analysis, as a function of rated funny clips, showed a significant difference against neutral videos (p < 0.001). In terms of the polygraphic changes, heart rate variability and the trapezius muscle surface electromyography measures were significantly higher upon exposure to funny vs. neutral videos (p < 0.5). The average pupil size and fixation drifts were significantly higher and lower, respectively, upon exposure to funny videos (p < 0.01). The qEEG data revealed the highest current source density (CSD) for the alpha frequency band localized in the left frontotemporal network (FTN) upon exposure to funny clips. Additionally, left FTN acquired the highest value for theta coherence z-score, while the beta CSD predominantly fell upon the salience network (SN). CONCLUSIONS: These preliminary data support the notion that left FTN may be targeted as a cortical hub for noninvasive neuromodulation as a single or adjunct therapy in remediating affective disorders in the clinical setting. Further studies are needed to test the hypotheses derived from the present report.

Mindfulness-based stress reduction triggers a long-term shift toward more positive appraisals of emotional ambiguity.

Reducing negative impacts of stress, for example through mindfulness training, benefits physical and psychological well-being and is becoming ever more crucial owing to large-scale societal uncertainties (e.g., COVID-19). Whereas extensive research has focused on mindfulness-related reductions in self-reported negativity, essentially no research has targeted task-based behavioral outcomes throughout long-term mindfulness trainings. Responses to emotionally ambiguous signals (e.g., surprised expressions), which might be appraised as either positive or negative, provide a nuanced assessment of one's emotional bias across diverse contexts, offering unique leverage for assessing the effects of mindfulness. Here, we compared the effects of short- and long-term training via Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction on ratings of faces with a relatively clear (angry, happy) and ambiguous (surprised) valence. Ratings became more positive for ambiguity from the start (Week 1) to end of training (Week 8; p < .001), but there were no short-term effects (from a single class session). This shift toward positivity continued through an additional 8-week follow-up (Week 16; p < .001). Notably, posttraining valence bias (Week 8) was uniquely predicted by the nonreactivity facet of mindfulness (p = .01). Together, mindfulness promotes a relatively long-lasting shift toward positivity bias, which is uniquely supported by reduced emotional reactivity. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Efficacy and safety of thread embedding acupuncture for facial expression muscles atrophy after peripheral facial paralysis: study protocol for a randomized controlled trial.

BACKGROUND: Facial expression muscles atrophy is one kind of sequelae after peripheral facial paralysis. It causes critical problems in facial appearance of patient as well as social and psychological problems. This study aims to evaluate the efficacy and safety of Thread-embedding acupuncture (TEA) for the management of facial expression muscles atrophy after peripheral facial paralysis. METHODS: This is a patient-assessor blinded, randomized, sham-controlled trial. A total of fifty-six eligible patients will be randomly divided into TEA (n=28) and sham TEA (STEA) (n=28) groups. Both groups will receive TEA or STEA treatment at the frontal muscle and the depressor anguli oris muscle, at one predefined points once a week for eight weeks. Additionally, both groups will receive traditional acupuncture treatment at ten acupoints (GB20, LI4, LR3, GB12, ST7, SI18, LI20, BL2, SJ23, ST4) twice a week for eight weeks as a concurrent treatment. B-mode ultrasonography will be used to assess the changes in facial expression muscle thickness ratio of the affected/healthy side at baseline and at 10 weeks after screening, as the primary outcome. House-Brackmann Grade and lip mobility score will be measured and analyzed at baseline and 4, 8, 10, and 12 weeks after screening, as secondary outcomes. DISCUSSION: The study will compare TEA with sham TEA to explore the feasibility for TEA in improving facial expression muscles atrophy after peripheral facial paralysis. TRIAL REGISTRATION: Chinese Clinical Trial Registry, ChiCTR1900027170. Registered on 3 November 2019, http://www.chictr.org.cn/edit.aspx?pid=45173&htm=4.

When Dogs Shrink the Typical Lengthening Effect Caused by Negative Emotions.

This paper examines how dogs can modulate the effects of emotion on time perception. To this end, participants performed a temporal bisection task with stimulus durations presented in the form of neutral or emotional facial expressions (angry, sad, and happy faces). In the first experiment, dog owners were compared with nondog owners, while in the second experiment, students were randomly assigned to one of the three waiting groups (waiting alone, with another person, or with a dog) before being confronted with the temporal bisection task. The results showed that dogs allowed the participants to regulate the intensity of negative emotional effects, while no statistical differences emerged for the happy facial expressions. In certain circumstances, dogs could even lead the subjects to generate underestimation of time when faced with negative facial expressions.

Effects of Mindfulness Training on Emotion Regulation in Patients With Depression: Reduced Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex Activation Indexes Early Beneficial Changes.

OBJECTIVE: Mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) have been found to be a promising approach for the treatment of recurrent courses of depression. However, little is known about their neural mechanisms. This functional magnetic resonance imaging study set out to investigate activation changes in corticolimbic regions during implicit emotion regulation. METHODS: Depressed patients with a recurrent lifetime history were randomized to receive a 2-week MBI (n = 16 completers) or psychoeducation and resting (PER; n = 22 completers). Before and after, patients underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging while labeling the affect of angry, happy, and neutral facial expressions and completed questionnaires assessing ruminative brooding, the ability to decenter from such thinking, and depressive symptoms. RESULTS: Activation decreased in the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) in response to angry faces after MBI (p < .01, voxel-wise family-wise error rate correction, T > 3.282; 56 mm3; Montreal Neurological Institute peak coordinate: 32, 24, 40), but not after PER. This change was highly correlated with increased decentring (r = -0.52, p = .033), decreased brooding (r = 0.60, p = .010), and decreased symptoms (r = 0.82, p = .005). Amygdala activation in response to happy faces decreased after PER (p < .01, family-wise error rate corrected; 392 mm3; Montreal Neurological Institute peak coordinate: 28, -4, -16), whereas the MBI group showed no significant change. CONCLUSIONS: The dlPFC is involved in emotion regulation, namely, reappraisal or suppression of negative emotions. Decreased right dlPFC activation might indicate that, after the MBI, patients abstained from engaging in elaboration or suppression of negative affective stimuli; a putatively important mechanism for preventing the escalation of negative mood.Trial Registration: The study is registered at ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT02801513; 16/06/2016).

The N400 and late occipital positivity in processing dynamic facial expressions with natural emotional voice.

People require multimodal emotional interactions to live in a social environment. Several studies using dynamic facial expressions and emotional voices have reported that multimodal emotional incongruency evokes an early sensory component of event-related potentials (ERPs), while others have found a late cognitive component. The integration mechanism of two different results remains unclear. We speculate that it is semantic analysis in a multimodal integration framework that evokes the late ERP component. An electrophysiological experiment was conducted using emotionally congruent or incongruent dynamic faces and natural voices to promote semantic analysis. To investigate the top-down modulation of the ERP component, attention was manipulated via two tasks that directed participants to attend to facial versus vocal expressions. Our results revealed interactions between facial and vocal emotional expressions, manifested as modulations of the auditory N400 ERP amplitudes but not N1 and P2 amplitudes, for incongruent emotional face-voice combinations only in the face-attentive task. A late occipital positive potential amplitude emerged only during the voice-attentive task. Overall, these findings support the idea that semantic analysis is a key factor in evoking the late cognitive component. The task effect for these ERPs suggests that top-down attention alters not only the amplitude of ERP but also the ERP component per se. Our results implicate a principle of emotional face-voice processing in the brain that may underlie complex audiovisual interactions in everyday communication.

The Role of the Auditory and Visual Modalities in the Perceptual Identification of Brazilian Portuguese Statements and Echo Questions.

This paper presents the results of three perceptual experiments investigating the role of auditory and visual channels for the identification of statements and echo questions in Brazilian Portuguese. Ten Brazilian speakers (five male) were video-recorded (frontal view of the face) while they produced a sentence ("Como você sabe"), either as a statement (meaning "As you know.") or as an echo question (meaning "As you know?"). Experiments were set up including the two different intonation contours. Stimuli were presented in conditions with clear and degraded audio as well as congruent and incongruent information from both channels. Results show that Brazilian listeners were able to distinguish statements and questions prosodically and visually, with auditory cues being dominant over visual ones. In noisy conditions, the visual channel improved the interpretation of prosodic cues robustly, while it degraded them in conditions where the visual information was incongruent with the auditory information. This study shows that auditory and visual information are integrated during speech perception, also when applied to prosodic patterns.

Effects of acute transcutaneous vagus nerve stimulation on emotion recognition in adolescent depression.

BACKGROUND: Transcutaneous vagus nerve stimulation (tVNS) is a promising therapeutic option for major depressive disorder (MDD) in adults. Alternative third-line treatments for MDD in adolescents are scarce. Here we aimed to assess the effects of acute tVNS on emotion recognition in adolescents with MDD. METHODS: Adolescents (14-17 years) with MDD (n = 33) and non-depressed controls (n = 30) received tVNS or sham-stimulation in a cross-sectional, case-control, within-subject cross-randomized controlled trial, while performing different tasks assessing emotion recognition. Correct responses, response times, and errors of omission and commission on three different computerized emotion recognition tasks were assessed as main outcomes. Simultaneous recordings of electrocardiography and electro dermal activity, as well as sampling of saliva for the determination of α-amylase, were used to quantify the effects on autonomic nervous system function. RESULTS: tVNS had no effect on the recognition of gradually or static expressed emotions but altered response inhibition on the emotional Go/NoGo-task. Specifically, tVNS increased the likelihood of omitting a response toward sad target-stimuli in adolescents with MDD, while decreasing errors (independent of the target emotion) in controls. Effects of acute tVNS on autonomic nervous system function were found in non-depressed controls only. CONCLUSIONS: Acute tVNS alters the recognition of briefly presented facial expressions of negative valence in adolescents with MDD while generally increasing emotion recognition in controls. tVNS seems to specifically alter early visual processing of stimuli of negative emotional valence in MDD. These findings suggest a potential therapeutic benefit of tVNS in adolescent MDD that requires further evaluation within clinical trials.

Pain Control with Lavender Oil in Premature Infants: A Double-Blind Randomized Controlled Study.

Objectives: Aromatherapy has become popular in pain control in recent years compared with other complementary methods. Lavender (Lavandula angustifolia Miller) is a fragrant essential oil used in aromatherapy for its antibacterial, antifungal, muscle-relaxing, and analgesic effects. The smell of lavender oil, known for its soothing effect on adults, has not been adequately investigated in regards to pain control in premature infants. The purpose of our study was to assign the effect of the scent of lavender oil on pain in preterm infants during heel lancing. Design: A double-blind randomized controlled clinical study. Settings/Location: The study was conducted in a third-level neonatal intensive care unit of Bezmialem Vakif University Hospital from March 2019 to November 2019. It consisted of two groups. Subjects: Sixty-one premature babies (24-37 weeks of gestation) were enrolled in the study. Interventions: Heel stick sampling for metabolic screening was used for both study groups. The interventions were performed by two experienced nurses. Heart rate, oxygen saturation, and the baby's facial expression were recorded by a camera 3 min before the intervention, during the sampling, and 3 min after the procedure. After collecting the data, the head researcher and the assistant researcher separately watched the videos and scored them by using the Premature Infant Pain Profile-Revised (PIPP-R). Outcome measures: The difference of pain scores (PIIP-R) between two groups. Results: There was a statistically significant difference between the two groups in terms of PIPP-R scores during and after the sampling (p = 0.008 and p = 0.03 respectively). The PIPP-R scores at the beginning of the procedure were not found to be significantly different between the groups (p > 0.05). Conclusions: Inhalation of lavender scent is effective in pain control in premature infants. It is safe and low cost; it does not interfere with medical care.

Children and adolescents' neural response to emotional faces and voices: Age-related changes in common regions of activation.

The perception of facial and vocal emotional expressions engages overlapping regions of the brain. However, at a behavioral level, the ability to recognize the intended emotion in both types of nonverbal cues follows a divergent developmental trajectory throughout childhood and adolescence. The current study a) identified regions of common neural activation to facial and vocal stimuli in 8- to 19-year-old typically-developing adolescents, and b) examined age-related changes in blood-oxygen-level dependent (BOLD) response within these areas. Both modalities elicited activation in an overlapping network of subcortical regions (insula, thalamus, dorsal striatum), visual-motor association areas, prefrontal regions (inferior frontal cortex, dorsomedial prefrontal cortex), and the right superior temporal gyrus. Within these regions, increased age was associated with greater frontal activation to voices, but not faces. Results suggest that processing facial and vocal stimuli elicits activation in common areas of the brain in adolescents, but that age-related changes in response within these regions may vary by modality.

Trust in AI Agent: A Systematic Review of Facial Anthropomorphic Trustworthiness for Social Robot Design.

As an emerging artificial intelligence system, social robot could socially communicate and interact with human beings. Although this area is attracting more and more attention, limited research has tried to systematically summarize potential features that could improve facial anthropomorphic trustworthiness for social robot. Based on the literature from human facial perception, product, and robot face evaluation, this paper systematically reviews, evaluates, and summarizes static facial features, dynamic features, their combinations, and related emotional expressions, shedding light on further exploration of facial anthropomorphic trustworthiness for social robot design.

Prosodic influence in face emotion perception: evidence from functional near-infrared spectroscopy.

Emotion is communicated via the integration of concurrently presented information from multiple information channels, such as voice, face, gesture and touch. This study investigated the neural and perceptual correlates of emotion perception as influenced by facial and vocal information by measuring changes in oxygenated hemoglobin (HbO) using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) and acquiring psychometrics. HbO activity was recorded from 103 channels while participants ([Formula: see text], [Formula: see text]) were presented with vocalizations produced in either a happy, angry or neutral prosody. Voices were presented alone or paired with an emotional face and compared with a face-only condition. Behavioral results indicated that when voices were paired with faces, a bias in the direction of the emotion of the voice was present. Subjects' responses also showed greater variance and longer reaction times when responding to the bimodal conditions when compared to the face-only condition. While both the happy and angry prosody conditions exhibited right lateralized increases in HbO compared to the neutral condition, these activations were segregated into posterior-anterior subdivisions by emotion. Specific emotional prosodies may therefore differentially influence emotion perception, with happy voices exhibiting posterior activity in receptive emotion areas and angry voices displaying activity in anterior expressive emotion areas.

Behavioral inhibition system sensitivity moderates audio-visual neutral information processing.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Misperception of other people's intention and emotions could cause and worsen interpersonal problems, thereby increasing the likelihood of developing depression and anxiety disorders among individuals who are already at risk for those conditions. Although multisensory emotional information is ubiquitous in the real world, most previous research focused exclusively on processing facial expressions. Addressing this gap, the current study examined the association between behavioral inhibition system (BIS) sensitivity and audio-visual emotional information processing. Sensitive BIS suggests heightened sensitivity to anxiety provoking stimuli and is a known risk factor for developing emotional disorders. We hypothesized that higher BIS levels would be associated with inefficient multisensory emotional processing, which might be pronounced for neutral stimuli. METHODS: Seventy-six undergraduates (40 women) completed a task while target faces (disgusted, happy, and neutral) were rendered invisible, and a voice (disgusted, happy, and neutral) or no voice was presented simultaneously. Participants' reaction times to indicate the location of the interocularly suppressed faces were measured. RESULTS: Individuals with lower BIS levels detected neutral faces faster when accompanied by neutral voices than by no voice; individuals with higher BIS levels, however, did not benefit from congruent auditory information when processing neutral faces. LIMITATIONS: The current study cannot address whether the finding is due to attentional biases, interpretation biases, or both in individuals who are prone to become anxious. CONCLUSION: Multisensory processing of neutral information is modulated by individuals' propensity to become anxious.

Uso de enzimas como tratamiento dermatológico regenerador de las líneas de expresión / Use of enzymes as a regenerative dermatological treatment of expression lines / Uso de enzimas como tratamento dermatológico regenerativo de linhas de expressão

INTRODUCCIÓN: el tratamiento con enzimas es una alternativa estética mínimamente invasiva para mejorar la apariencia facial y disminuir las líneas de expresión. OBJETIVO: Determinar el uso de las enzimas hialuronidasa, colagenasa y lipasa como tratamiento enzimático dermatológico para las líneas de expresión facial. MATERIALES Y MÉTODO: estudio de campo, prospectivo, población 457 pacientes que acudieron a la consulta dermatológica entre los años 2013 y 2018 para tratamiento con enzimas. El instrumento de recolección de datos fue la hoja de registro y la fuente documental las historias clínicas. El método estadístico fue descriptivo, la información se presenta en tablas y gráficos. RESULTADOS: la edad promedio de los pacientes fue de 45,2 ± 10,1 años, 40,9% recibió 2 kits de enzimas con los 3 componentes básicos de colagenasa, hialuronidasas y lipasas. Se encontró diferencia significativa en la relación de atención entre hombres y mujeres, de 1:14, es decir las mujeres acudieron más a la consulta solicitando la colocación de este tratamiento. CONCLUSIÓN: el tratamiento con enzimas aporta beneficios al incrementar la permeabilidad dérmica, aumenta el flujo sanguíneo y el drenaje linfático, disminuye los tabiques fibrosos de la celulitis, la flacidez, adiposidades, y rejuvenece el aspecto general. Por lo que se plantea como un tratamiento efectivo para disminuir las líneas de expresión.

INTRODUCTION: enzyme treatment represents a minimally invasive aesthetic alternative to improve facial appearance and decrease expression lines. OBJECTIVE: to determine the use of the enzymes hyaluronidase, collagenase and lipase as a dermatological enzyme treatment as a regenerative treatment for expression lines. METHODS: a prospective field study was conducted of a population made up of 457 patients who attended the UNIMEL dermatological consultation between 2013 and 2018 to be treated with enzymes. The data collection instrument was the record sheet and the documentary source was the medical records. The statistical method was descriptive, the information is presented in tables and graphs. RESULTS: the average age was 45.2 ± 10.1 years of age, to whom a majority of 40.9% were applied 2 kits of enzymes with the 3 basic components of collagenase, hyaluronidases and lipases to act synergistically each other enhancing functions and revitalizing the cells of the face. A significant difference was found in the care ratio between men and women, 1:14, that is, the women attended the consultation more requesting the placement of this treatment. CONCLUSION: the use of enzymes provides great benefits to increase skin permeability, increases lymphatic drainage, reduces fibrous septa of cellulite, sagging and fat, increases blood flow and rejuvenates the general appearance. So, it is proposed as an effective treatment to reduce expression lines

INTRODUÇÃO: o tratamento enzimático é uma alternativa estética minimamente invasiva para melhorar a aparência facial e diminuir as linhas de expressão. OBJETIVO: determinar o uso das enzimas hialuronidase, colagenase e lipase como tratamento enzimático dermatológico para linhas de expressão facial. MATERIAIS E MÉTODOS: estudo de campo em perspectiva, população de 457 pacientes que compareceram à consulta dermatológica entre 2013 e 2018 para tratamento enzimático. O instrumento de coleta de dados foi a folha de registros e a fonte documental foram os registros médicos. O método estatístico foi descritivo, as informações são apresentadas em tabelas e gráficos. RESULTADOS: a idade média dos pacientes foi de 45,2 ± 10,1 anos, 40,9% receberam 2 kits de enzimas com os 3 componentes básicos de colagenase, hialuronidases e lipases. Foi encontrada diferença significativa de 1:14 na relação de atenção entre homens e mulheres, ou seja, as mulheres compareceram mais frequentemente as consultas para a colocação desse tratamento do que aos homes. CONCLUSÃO: o tratamento enzimático oferece benefícios ao aumentar a permeabilidade dérmica, aumenta o fluxo sanguíneo e a drenagem linfática, reduz os septos fibrosos da celulite, flacidez, adiposidade e rejuvenesce a aparência geral. Por isso, é proposto como um tratamento eficaz para diminuir as linhas de expressão.

Hormonal and modality specific effects on males' emotion recognition ability.

Successful emotion recognition is a key component of human socio-emotional communication skills. However, little is known about the factors impacting males' accuracy in emotion recognition tasks. This pre-registered study examined potential candidates, focusing on the modality of stimulus presentation, emotion category and individual baseline hormone levels. In an additional exploratory analysis, we examined the association of testosterone x cortisol interaction with recognition accuracy and reaction times. We obtained accuracy and reaction time scores from 282 males who categorized voice, face and voice-face stimuli for nonverbal emotional content. Results showed that recognition accuracy was significantly higher in the audio-visual than in the auditory or visual modality. While Spearman's rank correlations showed no significant association of testosterone (T) with recognition accuracy or with response times for specific emotions, the logistic and linear regression models uncovered some evidence for a positive association between T and recognition accuracy as well as between cortisol (C) and reaction time. In addition, the overall effect size of T by C interaction with recognition accuracy and reaction time was significant, but small. Our results establish that audio-visual congruent stimuli enhance recognition accuracy and provide novel empirical support by showing that the interaction of testosterone and cortisol relates to males' accuracy and response times in emotion recognition tasks.

How is Mindfulness Linked to Negative and Positive Affect? Rumination as an Explanatory Process in a Prospective Longitudinal Study of Adolescents.

Research shows greater mindfulness is associated with less negative affect and more positive affect. Fewer studies have examined the mediating psychological processes linking mindfulness to these outcomes in adolescents. This three-wave, prospective longitudinal study examines rumination-the tendency to engage in repetitive and negative self-focused thinking-as one potential explanatory process. High school students (N = 599, Mage = 16.3 years; 49% girls) completed a short-form version of the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire, in addition to self-report measures of rumination and negative and positive affect three times over the course of a school year. Autoregressive, cross-lagged panel models tested reciprocal, prospective associations between mindfulness, rumination, and negative and positive affect, while accounting for prior levels of each construct, within-wave covariances, and gender and grade level. The results showed that the nonjudgment mindfulness facet (and the total mindfulness score) predicted cross-wave reductions in rumination, that in turn predicted cross-wave reductions in negative affect. No evidence for mediation was found for positive affect, or for any of the other mindfulness facets (describe, acting with awareness, and nonreactivity). This study provides suggestive evidence that individual differences in mindfulness, and in particular nonjudgmental acceptance, prospectively predict less negative affect through lower rumination.

Neural Responses to Infant Emotions and Emotional Self-Awareness in Mothers and Fathers during Pregnancy.

Neuroscientific research has largely investigated the neurobiological correlates of maternal and (to a much lesser extent) paternal responsiveness in the post-partum period. In contrast, much less is known about the neural processing of infant emotions during pregnancy. Twenty mothers and 19 fathers were recruited independently during the third trimester of pregnancy. High-density electroencephalography (hdEEG) was recorded while expectant parents passively viewed images representing distressed, ambiguous, happy, and neutral faces of unknown infants. Correlational analyses were performed to detect a link between neural responses to infant facial expressions and emotional self-awareness. In response to infant emotions, mothers and fathers showed similar cerebral activity in regions involved in high-order socio-affective processes. Mothers and fathers also showed different brain activity in premotor regions implicated in high-order motor control, in occipital regions involved in visuo-spatial information processing and visual mental imagery, as well as in inferior parietal regions involved in attention allocation. Low emotional self-awareness negatively correlated with activity in parietal regions subserving empathy in mothers, while it positively correlated with activity in temporal and occipital areas implicated in mentalizing and visual mental imagery in fathers. This study may enlarge knowledge on the neural response to infant emotions during pregnancy.

Acute effects of oxytocin in music performance anxiety: a crossover, randomized, placebo-controlled trial.

RATIONALE: Individuals with music performance anxiety (MPA) present physical, behavioral, and cognitive manifestations of anxiety, in addition to information processing deficits, especially in facial emotion recognition (FER). OBJECTIVES: To assess the effects of a single dose of intranasal oxytocin (24 IU) on FER in a sample of musicians with high and low MPA (primary outcome), as well as indicators of mood/anxiety and self-assessed performance (secondary outcomes). METHODS: Crossover, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial involving 43 male musicians with different levels of MPA. Participants completed a static facial emotion recognition task and self-rated mood and performance scales. Data were analyzed using ANOVA 2 × 0 for crossover trials and the Omnibus test (measure of separability between intervention and carryover effects). RESULTS: Only musicians with high MPA treated with oxytocin had a higher accuracy in the recognition of happiness (p < 0.03; d > 0.72). No effects of oxytocin were found on mood indicators or on self-perceived performance, regardless of MPA level. CONCLUSIONS: The results indicate possible benefits of the acute treatment with oxytocin in MPA, which may improve the management of this common and disabling condition that affects professional musicians. The appropriate perception of positive feedback may increase confidence and feelings of social acceptance, reducing symptoms associated with the condition. The lack of effects on mood/anxiety and cognition may be explained by the context-dependent characteristic of the effects of oxytocin, since the experiment did not represent an actual situation of social threat. TRIAL REGISTRATION: Brazilian Clinical Trials Registry (Registro Brasileiro de Ensaios Clínicos): No. RBR-9cph2q.