TY - JOUR
T1 - Distance to the Neutral Face Predicts Arousal Ratings of Dynamic Facial Expressions in Individuals With and Without Autism Spectrum Disorder
AU - Schneider, Jan N.
AU - Brick, Timothy R.
AU - Dziobek, Isabel
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank Prof. Dr. Stefan Röpke and Dr. Behnoush Behnia from the Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin for distributing our survey to individuals diagnosed with autism. Funding. This research was funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (“Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung”) under the EMOTISK project (funding number 16SV7240K). JNS was furthermore supported by a grant of the Potsdam Graduate School and with research materials and facilities from the Berlin School of Mind and Brain of Humboldt-Universität Berlin.
Funding Information:
This research was funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (“Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung”) under the EMOTISK project (funding number 16SV7240K). JNS was furthermore supported by a grant of the Potsdam Graduate School and with research materials and facilities from the Berlin School of Mind and Brain of Humboldt-Universität Berlin.
Publisher Copyright:
© Copyright © 2020 Schneider, Brick and Dziobek.
PY - 2020/11/27
Y1 - 2020/11/27
N2 - Arousal is one of the dimensions of core affect and frequently used to describe experienced or observed emotional states. While arousal ratings of facial expressions are collected in many studies it is not well understood how arousal is displayed in or interpreted from facial expressions. In the context of socioemotional disorders such as Autism Spectrum Disorder, this poses the question of a differential use of facial information for arousal perception. In this study, we demonstrate how automated face-tracking tools can be used to extract predictors of arousal judgments. We find moderate to strong correlations among all measures of static information on one hand and all measures of dynamic information on the other. Based on these results, we tested two measures, average distance to the neutral face and average facial movement speed, within and between neurotypical individuals (N = 401) and individuals with autism (N = 19). Distance to the neutral face was predictive of arousal in both groups. Lower mean arousal ratings were found for the autistic group, but no difference in correlation of the measures and arousal ratings could be found between groups. Results were replicated in an high autistic traits group. The findings suggest a qualitatively similar perception of arousal for individuals with and without autism. No correlations between valence ratings and any of the measures could be found, emphasizing the specificity of our tested measures. Distance and speed predictors share variability and thus speed should not be discarded as a predictor of arousal ratings.
AB - Arousal is one of the dimensions of core affect and frequently used to describe experienced or observed emotional states. While arousal ratings of facial expressions are collected in many studies it is not well understood how arousal is displayed in or interpreted from facial expressions. In the context of socioemotional disorders such as Autism Spectrum Disorder, this poses the question of a differential use of facial information for arousal perception. In this study, we demonstrate how automated face-tracking tools can be used to extract predictors of arousal judgments. We find moderate to strong correlations among all measures of static information on one hand and all measures of dynamic information on the other. Based on these results, we tested two measures, average distance to the neutral face and average facial movement speed, within and between neurotypical individuals (N = 401) and individuals with autism (N = 19). Distance to the neutral face was predictive of arousal in both groups. Lower mean arousal ratings were found for the autistic group, but no difference in correlation of the measures and arousal ratings could be found between groups. Results were replicated in an high autistic traits group. The findings suggest a qualitatively similar perception of arousal for individuals with and without autism. No correlations between valence ratings and any of the measures could be found, emphasizing the specificity of our tested measures. Distance and speed predictors share variability and thus speed should not be discarded as a predictor of arousal ratings.
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U2 - 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.577494
DO - 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.577494
M3 - Article
C2 - 33329224
AN - SCOPUS:85106838303
SN - 1664-1078
VL - 11
JO - Frontiers in Psychology
JF - Frontiers in Psychology
M1 - 577494
ER -