Comparison with others influences encoding and recognition of their faces: Behavioural and ERP evidence.

In daily life, faces are often memorized within contexts involving interpersonal interactions. However, little is known about whether interpersonal interaction-related contexts influence face memory. The present study aimed to understand this question by investigating how social comparison-related context affects face encoding and recognition. To address this issue, 40 participants were informed that they and another player each played a monetary game and were then presented with both of their outcomes (either monetary gain or loss). Subsequently, participants were shown the face of the player whom they were just paired with. After all the faces had been encoded, participants were asked to perform a sudden old/new recognition task involving these faces. The results showed that, during the encoding phase, another player's monetary gain, compared to loss, resulted in more negative responses in the N170 and early posterior negativity (EPN)/N250 to relevant players' faces when participants encountered monetary loss and a smaller late positive potential (LPP) response irrespective of self-related outcomes. In the subsequent recognition phase, preceding another player's monetary gain as compared to loss led to better recognition performance and stronger EPN/N250 and LPP responses to the faces of relevant players when participants had lost some amount of money. These findings suggest that the social comparison-related context, particularly self-disadvantageous outcomes in the context, influences the memory of comparators' faces.

Competition influences outcome processing involving social comparison: An ERP study.

In a complicated social context, outcome evaluation involves not only oneself but also others in relation to the self (i.e., social comparison). Previous event-related potential (ERP) studies have investigated the processing of social comparison-related outcomes when one's interests are independent of the interests of others (i.e., noncompetition circumstances). However, it is unclear how social comparison-related outcomes are processed in the brain when there are conflicts of interest between oneself and others (i.e., competition circumstances). To address this issue, participants in the current study were asked to perform an attentional task with several peers and were subsequently presented with self-related outcomes (i.e., the performance difference between the current trial and several preceding trials) and social comparison-related outcomes (i.e., the performance difference between oneself and their peer). Importantly, rewards and punishments were based on social comparison-related outcomes in the competition condition and on self-related outcomes in the noncompetition condition. ERP results revealed that in the competition condition, positive outcomes involving social comparison elicited a greater P300 response than negative outcomes, whereas this effect was not observed in the noncompetition condition. Additionally, there was generally a larger late positive potential (LPP) response to negative outcomes involving social comparison than to positive outcomes only when one obtained a self-related positive outcome in the competition condition. These findings suggest that competition might strengthen outcome processing involving social comparison at late time ranges relying on self-related outcomes to some extent.

Altered Putamen Activation for Social Comparison-Related Feedback in Social Anxiety Disorder: A Pilot Study.

INTRODUCTION: Social anxiety disorder (SAD) is characterized by abnormal processing of performance-related social stimuli. Previous studies have shown altered emotional experiences and activations of different sub-regions of the striatum during processing of social stimuli in patients with SAD. However, whether and to what extent social comparisons affect behavioural and neural responses to feedback stimuli in patients with SAD is unknown. MATERIALS AND METHODS: To address this issue, emotional ratings and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) responses were assessed while patients suffering from SAD and healthy controls (HC) were required to perform a choice task and received performance feedback (correct, incorrect, non-informative) that varied in relation to the performance of fictitious other participants (a few, half, or most of others had the same outcome). RESULTS: Across all performance feedback conditions, fMRI analyses revealed reduced activations in bilateral putamen when feedback was assumed to be received by only a few compared to half of the other participants in patients with SAD. Nevertheless, analysis of rating data showed a similar modulation of valence and arousal ratings in patients with SAD and HC depending on social comparison-related feedback. CONCLUSIONS: This suggests altered neural processing of performance feedback depending on social comparisons in patients with SAD.

Behavioral and ERP effects of encoded facial expressions on facial identity recognition depend on recognized facial expressions.

Behavioral and event-related potential (ERP) studies have shown that the expressions of a face displayed in the encoding phase (encoded facial expressions) influences identity recognition of this face in a later recognition phase. As facial expressions displayed in the recognition phase (recognized facial expressions) might also influence facial identity recognition, the current study investigated whether the effect of encoded facial expressions on facial identity recognition changed depending on recognized facial expressions. Therefore, participants were asked to learn facial identities displaying angry, happy or neutral expressions during the encoding phase. In the subsequent recognition phase, participants were presented with the learned identities and several novel identities and asked to judge whether the prompted identities had been learned. Each identity displayed angry, happy and neutral expressions. The results showed that d' scores were smaller for happy-recognized identities (i.e., learned identities displaying happy expressions during the recognition phase) in the angry-encoded (i.e., learned identities that had displayed angry expressions during the preceding encoding phase) condition than in the neutral-encoded condition and for neutral-recognized identities in the angry-encoded condition than in the happy-encoded condition. ERP results showed that angry-encoded identities elicited less negative responses in the P200 and early posterior negativity (EPN)/N250 components and less positive responses in the late positive potential (LPP) component than happy-encoded identities. For neutral-recognized identities, LPP responses were reduced in the angry-encoded condition compared with those in the neutral-encoded condition. These findings might contribute to understanding the influence of previous and current facial expressions on facial identity recognition.

Study on the antigens and antibodies of Mur and Mia blood groups in southern China.

BACKGROUND: The frequency of Mur and Mia blood group antigens in Asian population is much higher than that in Caucasian population. However, due to the scarcity and high price of commercial detection reagents, there are few studies on antigen and antibody detection and comparative analysis in large samples. OBJECTIVE: To study the occurrence frequency, antigen correlation and antibody properties of Mur and Mia antigens and their corresponding antibodies in southern China. METHODS: Mur and Mia antigens and antibodies in local blood donors and patients were detected by routine serological microplate method. Statistical methods were used to calculate the incidence of two antigens and antibodies and analyze their correlation. RESULTS: Among blood donors, the positive rates of Mur and Mia antigens were 6.4 % and 6.5 % respectively, with no significant difference (P > 0.05). In this region, the incidence of anti-"Mur" and anti-"Mia" was 0.65 % and 0.45 % respectively. But significant difference existed between blood donors and patients (P < 0.05). Among the anti-"Mur" and anti-"Mia" positive patients, most of the antibodies were IgM or IgM + IgG mixed type and had saline activity. CONCLUSION: Mur and Mia antigens and their corresponding antibodies have a high frequency in the population of southern China. In the routine clinical detection of irregular antibodies, Mur or Mia positive (GP.Mur) should be added to screen erythrocytes. Moreover, given the high correlation between Mur and Mia antigens expression on red blood cells, using monoclonal antibodies against Mia could predict the presence of Mur antigen.

Effects of experienced regret on risky decision making are dependent on risky degree.

We investigated whether experienced regret influences risky decision making in future dissimilar situations and whether this effect is affected by risky degree. Therefore, participants (N = 39 and 54 in Experiment 1 and 2, respectively) were asked to select one of the two options. In the experienced regret condition, the selected option was worse than the unselected option; in the control condition, the information about the unselected option was unknown to the participants. Subsequently, participants were required to either keep the selected option or to gamble. Additionally, Experiment 2 varied in risky degree of the gamble from low to high. Results showed that experienced regret enhanced possibilities of gamble under low risk (Experiment 1 and 2). Under high risk, however, the effect of experienced regret was reversed (Experiment 2). The findings might suggest that experienced regret affects risky decision making in future dissimilar situations dependently on risky degree.

Counterfactual comparison modulates fairness consideration in the mini-ultimatum game: an event-related potentials study.

Existing literature on the mini-ultimatum game indicates that counterfactual comparison between chosen and unchosen alternatives is of great importance for individual's fairness consideration. However, it is still unclear how counterfactual comparison influences the electrophysiological responses to unfair chosen offers. In conjunction with event-related potentials' (ERPs) technique, the current study aimed to explore the issue by employing a modified version of the mini-ultimatum game where a fixed set of two alternatives (unfair offer vs. fair alternative, unfair vs. hyperfair alternative, unfair offer vs. hyperunfair alternative) was presented before the chosen offer. The behavioral results showed that participants were more likely to accept unfair chosen offers when the unchosen alternative was hyperunfair than when the unchosen alternative was fair or hyperfair. The ERPs results showed that the feedback-related negativity (FRN) elicited by unfair chosen offers was insensitive to the type of unchosen alternative when correcting for possible overlap with other components. In contrast, unfair chosen offers elicited larger P300 amplitudes when the unchosen alternative was hyperunfair than when the unchosen alternative was fair or hyperfair. These findings suggest that counterfactual comparison may take effect at later stages of fairness consideration as reflected by the P300.

The neuronal signature of surprised facial expression processing under different attentional focuses: A time-domain and time-frequency study.

Previous studies have shown that high-arousal positive and negative facial expressions influence event-related potential (ERP) and time-frequency responses depending on attentional focuses. However, little is known about how relevant neural responses are influenced by surprised facial expressions, which are also high in arousal but ambiguous in valence. To address the issue, 38 participants were presented with surprised, happy, angry and neutral facial expressions. Attention was manipulated to focus on facial emotional attributes, facial non-emotional attributes, non-facial attributes, or was free to the participants. ERP results showed larger N170 responses to surprised compared to neutral facial expressions when attention focused on facial attributes and to surprised compared to angry and neutral facial expressions when attention focused on facial non-emotional attributes. Time-frequency analyses revealed reduced power of early occipital theta to surprised compared to happy and angry expressions when attention focused on facial emotions and to surprised compared to angry expressions when attention focused on non-facial stimuli. Parietal delta power was smaller for surprised facial expressions than for angry facial expressions when attention focused on facial emotions and for surprised facial expressions than for angry and neutral facial expressions when attention was directed to non-facial stimuli. These findings might suggest that neural responses to surprised facial expressions are modulated by attentional focus.

Acquisition and generalization of emotional and neural responses to faces associated with negative and positive feedback behaviours.

Faces can acquire emotional meaning by learning to associate individuals with specific behaviors. Here, we investigated emotional evaluation and brain activations toward faces of persons who had given negative or positive evaluations to others. Furthermore, we investigated how emotional evaluations and brain activation generalize to perceptually similar faces. Valence ratings indicated learning and generalization effects for both positive and negative faces. Brain activation, measured with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), showed significantly increased activation in the fusiform gyrus (FG) to negatively associated faces but not positively associated ones. Remarkably, brain activation in FG to faces to which emotional meaning (negative and positive) was successfully generalized was decreased compared to neutral faces. This suggests that the emotional relevance of faces is not simply associated with increased brain activation in visual areas. While, at least for negative conditions, faces paired with negative feedback behavior are related to potentiated brain responses, the opposite is seen for perceptually very similar faces despite generalized emotional responses.

Acute primary mesenteric venous thrombosis: A case report and literature review.

INTRODUCTION AND IMPORTANCE: Mesenteric vein thrombosis (MVT) is a pathological condition characterized by the obstruction of blood flow caused by the formation of new thrombi in the mesenteric veins, resulting in the development of intestinal ischemia due to the absence of collateral circulation. The insidious onset, clinical manifestations and lack of specificity of laboratory tests are significant factors that impede the timely diagnosis of MVT in clinical setting. CASE PRESENTATION: This article critically examined the pathogenesis, diagnosis and treatment of a 60-year-old male patient with MVT, while also exploring the etiology, clinical manifestations, diagnostic approaches and management advancement with MVT. CLINICAL DISCUSSION: We determined that CT angiography serves as a pivotal method for early detection of MVT. Proactive anticoagulation strategy utilizing unfractionated heparin or low molecular weight heparin can notably decrease the mortality rate of patients afflicted with MVT and enhance the clinical outcome. CONCLUSION: Surgery is generally not endorsed as the preferential therapeutic intervention for mesenteric venous thrombosis, barring patients with concurrent intestinal necrosis or perforation.

The priming effects of emotional vocal expressions on face encoding and recognition: An ERP study.

Previous studies have suggested that emotional primes, presented as visual stimuli, influence face memory (e.g., encoding and recognition). However, due to stimulus-associated issues, whether emotional primes affect face encoding when the priming stimuli are presented in an auditory modality remains controversial. Moreover, no studies have investigated whether the effects of emotional auditory primes are maintained in later stages of face memory, such as face recognition. To address these issues, participants in the present study were asked to memorize angry and neutral faces. The faces were presented after a simple nonlinguistic interjection expressed with angry or neutral prosodies. Subsequently, participants completed an old/new recognition task in which only faces were presented. Event-related potential (ERP) results showed that during the encoding phase, all faces preceded by an angry vocal expression elicited larger N170 responses than faces preceded by a neutral vocal expression. Angry vocal expression also enhanced the late positive potential (LPP) responses specifically to angry faces. In the subsequent recognition phase, preceding angry vocal primes reduced early LPP responses to both angry and neutral faces and late LPP responses specifically to neutral faces. These findings suggest that the negative emotion of auditory primes influenced face encoding and recognition.

Current and lasting effects of affect labeling on late positive potential (LPP) amplitudes elicited by negative events.

INTRODUCTION: Labeling the emotional aspect of self-unrelated stimuli (i.e., affect labeling) is a crucial strategy for implicit emotion regulation. However, it is uncertain whether affect labeling influences event-related potential (ERP) responses (e.g., the late positive potential, LPP) to negative stimuli in comparison with control conditions in which attention is shifted to the emotional content of the stimuli (e.g., affect matching). Additionally, it is unknown whether affect labeling has a lasting effect on the processing of negative stimuli. METHODS: Participants were required to label the emotion (negative or neutral) of target pictures with two words, to match the emotion with alternative pictures or to merely view the target pictures. Target pictures were presented again immediately after the regulation task. After all the target pictures had been labeled, matched and viewed, the pictures were re-exposed for the third time. RESULTS: The results showed that negative pictures elicited larger late LPP responses during the affect labeling task than during other tasks. However, the LPP responses were smaller for negative pictures in the affect labeling condition than in the other conditions when target pictures were re-exposed immediately after the task. When target pictures were re-presented again long after the regulation tasks, the LPP responses were smaller for negative stimuli with a history of affect labeling than viewing, whereas this effect did not differ between the affect labeling and matching conditions. CONCLUSION: The current findings suggest that affect labeling has current effects and, to some extent, has lasting effects on negative stimulus processing.

The influence of childhood emotional neglect on emotional face processing in young adults.

Childhood emotional neglect (CEN) refers to a failure to meet the basic emotional needs of a child, which can seriously impact interpersonal communication and psychological health in young adults. Emotional face processing is critical in interpersonal communication; however, whether CEN affects this processing in young adults has not been investigated. Therefore, the current study aimed to explore the effects of CEN on emotional face processing in young adults. Using the Child Trauma Questionnaire, an online survey was conducted with 5010 students from four universities in Tianjin, China. After online interviews and diagnosis by professional doctors, we obtained 20 participants with CEN (CEN group) and 20 without CEN (control group). None of the participants had any mental diseases. A 2 × 4 mixed design was used to investigate the differences in accuracy and response time when identifying the valence of the emotional faces. Compared to the control group, the CEN group identified the valence of all emotional faces more slowly, but there was no significant difference between the two groups in terms of accuracy. CEN caused delayed emotional face processing in young adults, which may be related to unresponsive, unavailable, and limited emotional interaction patterns between parents and their children.

[Evaluation of continuous monitoring of bispectral index in prognosis in patients with acute brain injury].

OBJECTIVE: To discuss the effect of continuous monitoring of bispectral index (BIS) on the prognosis of patients with acute brain injury. METHODS: A retrospective study was carried out, 61 patients with acute brain injury admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU) from March 2009 to July 2010 were divided into survival group (n=25) and death group (n=36). The BIS was continuously monitored for 12 hours within the first 3 days or 24 hours after stoppage of sedative after admission to ICU. The mean value of BIS (BISmean), the maximal value of BIS (BISmax), and the minimal value of BIS (BISmin) were evaluated. At the same time, the acute physiology and chronic health evaluationII (APACHEII) score, probability of survival (PS) and Glasgow coma score (GCS) were evaluated. The values of serum S100 protein and neuron-specific enolase (NSE) were determined. The relationship between BISmean and GCS, S100 protein and NSE were respectively analyzed. RESULTS: (1)There was no significant difference in the sex, age, or duration of mechanical ventilation between two groups. APACHEII score in death group was significantly higher than the survival group (27.36±5.99 vs. 23.28±6.69), PS was significantly lower than the survival group (0.31±0.17 vs. 0.49±0.19), and length of stay in ICU (days) was significantly lower than that of the survival group (6.33±4.48 vs. 27.88±54.46), P<0.05 or P<0.01. (2) BISmean, BISmax, BISmin, GCS in death group were significantly lower than those in the survival group (BISmean: 35.45±28.31 vs. 55.91±17.53, BISmax: 51.92±34.24 vs. 74.84±16.58, BISmin: 22.39±24.83 vs. 39.68±15.72, GCS score: 3.64±1.19 vs. 5.60±2.22), P<0.05 or P<0.01, while serum S100 protein and NSE levels were significantly higher than the survival group [S100 protein (µg/L): 7.54±10.49 vs. 1.18±1.57, NSE (µg/L): 120.74±109.01 vs. 49.83±54.94], both P<0.01. (3) By bivariate analysis, BISmean was positively correlated with GCS (r=0.379, P=0.003), whereas it was found to be negatively correlated with S100 protein and NSE levels (r1=-0.418, P1=0.001; r2=-0.290, P2=0.023). CONCLUSION: BIS monitoring can be applied as an early objective indicator to evaluate the prognosis of the acute brain injured patients with the characteristics of being noninvasive, intuitive, easy-to-manipulate, and non-stop monitoring.

ERP Effects of Malicious Envy on Schadenfreude in Gain and Loss Frames.

Previous behavioral and neural studies have shown the effects of malicious envy on schadenfreude. However, it is unclear whether these effects are modulated by contextual frames (e.g., gain and loss frames). Thus, the present study aimed to investigate whether behavioral and event-related potential (ERP) effects of malicious envy on schadenfreude were different in gain and loss frames. To address this issue, the participants in the present study believed they were playing a monetary game with several other players. In the malicious envy condition, the participants won less money than the player in the gain frame and lost more money in the loss frame; in the control condition, both participants and the player gained little money in the gain frame and lost much in the loss frame. Subsequently, the participants were informed that the player encountered a misfortune, i.e., gained little in the gain frame and lost much in the loss frame. Results showed that malicious envy increased feelings of schadenfreude and ERP responses when the player encountered a misfortune. Moreover, increased ERP responses by malicious envy occurred at the feedback-related negativity (FRN), and early late positive potential (LPP) time ranges in the gain frame but at the late LPP time range in the loss frame. The findings might suggest that malicious envy affects schadenfreude and corresponding neural activity, whereas the neural effects occur at comparatively early time ranges in the gain frame but at a later time range in the loss frame.

The Effect of Malicious Envy on Schadenfreude When Schadenfreude Is Elicited Through Social Comparisons.

Previous studies have investigated whether envy, particularly malicious envy, increases feelings of schadenfreude and whether this effect is evident in both gain and loss frames. However, as a social-comparison-based emotion, schadenfreude was not investigated through social comparisons in these previous studies. Thus, the present study aimed to investigate whether malicious envy influences schadenfreude when schadenfreude is elicited in the context of precise and ambiguous social comparisons. To address this issue, participants in the present study were asked to play a monetary game with several other players. In the experimental condition, participants gained less or lost more than the other player; in the control condition, both the participants and the player gained little or lost much. Subsequently, the participants observed that the player encountered a misfortune, that is, gained less or lost more money than the participant. The results showed that when participants knew the exact amount of monetary gained and lost by themselves and the other player (i.e., precise social comparisons), malicious envy increased feelings of schadenfreude only in the loss frame rather than in the gain frame. More importantly, malicious envy turned out to reduce feelings of schadenfreude in both gain and loss frames, when participants did not know the exact amount (i.e., ambiguous social comparisons). The findings provide novel evidence that malicious envy does not always increase schadenfreude particularly when schadenfreude is elicited through social comparisons.

Working memory load reduces the processing of outcome evaluation involving others but not oneself: Event-related potential evidence.

Previous event-related potential (ERP) studies have suggested that self-related and non-self-related outcomes are processed simultaneously. However, the studies investigated situations in which individuals had sufficient attentional/cognitive resources to process both of the outcomes. It is unknown whether self-related and non-self-unrelated outcomes could still be processed simultaneously when resources are limited. To address this issue, 32 female participants in the present study were asked to perform a working memory task. To manipulate the amount of available attentional/cognitive resources, participants were asked to memorize a letter in the low load condition and five letters in the high load condition. During letter consolidation, participants were informed that they and another player each performed a gambling task and were subsequently presented with both of the outcomes. ERP results showed that others' monetary loss elicited larger P200 and late positive potential amplitudes than others' monetary gain under a low working memory load, whereas a high load reduced these effects. However, working memory load did not influence the effect of self-outcome on ERP responses. Therefore, the findings suggest that the amount of available attentional/cognitive resources alters the evaluation of non-self-related but not self-related outcomes.

Trait anxiety predicts amygdalar responses during direct processing of threat-related pictures.

Previous studies on the associations between trait anxiety and amygdalar responses to threat stimuli have resulted in mixed findings, possibly due to sample characteristics, specific tasks, and analytical methods. The present functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study aimed to investigate linear or non-linear associations between trait anxiety and amygdalar responses in a sample of participants with low, medium, and high trait anxiety scores. During scanning, participants were presented with threat-related or neutral pictures and had either to solve an emotional task or an emotional-unrelated distraction task. Results showed that only during the explicit task trait anxiety was associated with right amygdalar responses to threat-related pictures as compared to neutral pictures. The best model was a cubic model with increased amygdala responses for very low and medium trait anxiety values but decreased amygdala activation for very high trait anxiety values. The findings imply a non-linear relation between trait anxiety and amygdala activation depending on task conditions.

Negative expectations influence behavioral and ERP responses in the subsequent recognition of expectancy-incongruent neutral events.

Previous studies have shown that expectancy incongruence in emotional stimuli influences the encoding (i.e., the first stage of memory processing) of the stimuli. However, it is unknown about whether expectancy incongruence influences later stages of memory processing, such as recognition. To this end, expectancy cues were presented prior to emotional pictures. Most often, the cues accurately indicated the emotional consequences of the pictures, but in some cases the consequence was incongruent with the expectations, and a picture from another emotional category was presented. Afterward, participants completed an unexpected recognition task in which old and novel pictures were not preceded by expectancy cues. The results showed that, in the encoding phase, expectancy incongruence reduced response accuracy when categorizing pictorial emotions, and the effect was smaller for neutral pictures than for negative pictures. ERP results showed stronger and weaker responses to expectancy incongruent pictures compared to congruent pictures in time ranges related to the encoding-related early and middle late positive potential (LPP), respectively. In the subsequent recognition phase, d' scores were higher for incongruent neutral pictures than for congruent ones. Expectancy incongruence enlarged the P2 response but reduced the recognition-related early LPP response for neutral pictures. However, effects of expectancy incongruence were not seen for negative pictures. Therefore, the findings in the present study indicate that negative expectations influence the later recognition of expectancy incongruent neutral events, whereas negative events are more resistant to the effects of expectation incongruence.

Recognition of Contextually Threat-Related Scenes is Enhanced by Preceding Emotionally Incongruent Facial Expression.

Previous studies on intentional and incidental face memory have investigated the effects of emotional facial expression on facial recognition itself. However, it is still uncertain whether facial expression influences later recognition of other emotional stimuli, such as emotional scenes. To address this issue, participants during the encoding phase were presented with emotional scenes together with facial expressions. The emotion of the scenes was either congruent or incongruent with that of the facial expression. In order to increase the attention towards faces/facial expressions, the task was related to faces rather than scenes, for example, the participants were asked either to memorize the facial identities (intentional face learning, Experiment 1) or to identify the gender of the faces (incidental face learning, Experiment 2). Subsequently, the participants were asked to perform an unexpected old/new recognition task regarding the scene pictures. In general, the results showed that recognition of threat-related scenes was enhanced by a preceding emotionally incongruent facial expression irrespective of intentional or incidental face learning. The findings indicate that facial expression influences recognition of contextual threat-related scenes.