A false trail to follow: Differential effects of the facial feedback signals from the upper and lower face on the recognition of micro-expressions

Abstract

Micro-expressions, as fleeting facial expressions, are very important for judging people's true emotions, thus can provide an essential behavioral clue for lie and dangerous demeanor detection. From embodied accounts of cognition, we derived a novel hypothesis that facial feedback from upper and lower facial regions has differential effects on micro-expression recognition. This hypothesis was tested and supported across three studies. Specifically, the results of Study 1 showed that people became better judges of intense micro-expressions with a duration of 450 ms when the facial feedback from upper face was enhanced via a restricting gel. Additional results of Study 2 showed that the recognition accuracy of subtle micro-expressions was significantly impaired under all duration conditions (50, 150, 333, and 450 ms) when facial feedback from lower face was enhanced. In addition, the results of Study 3 also revealed that blocking the facial feedback of lower face, significantly boosted the recognition accuracy of subtle and intense micro-expressions under all duration conditions (150 and 450 ms). Together, these results highlight the role of facial feedback in judging the subtle movements of micro-expressions.