Are facial expressions of emotion produced by categorical affect programs or dynamically driven by appraisal?

Full Abstract

The different assumptions made by discrete and componential emotion theories about the nature of the facial expression of emotion and the underlying mechanisms are reviewed. Explicit and implicit predictions are derived from each model. It is argued that experimental expression-production paradigms rather than recognition studies are required to critically test these differential predictions. Data from a large-scale actor portrayal study are reported to demonstrate the utility of this approach. The frequencies with which 12 professional actors use major facial muscle actions individually and in combination to express 14 major emotions show little evidence for emotion-specific prototypical affect programs. Rather, the results encourage empirical investigation of componential emotion model predictions of dynamic configurations of appraisal-driven adaptive facial actions. (c) 2007 APA, all rights reserved.

Author information

Author/s: Scherer, Klaus R (KR); Ellgring, Heiner (H);

Affiliation: Department of Psychology, Swiss Centre for Affective Sciences, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland. Klaus.Scherer(-atsign-)pse.unige.ch

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Journal Article

Journal: Emotion (Washington, D.C.) (Emotion), published in United States. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2007-Feb; vol 7 (issue 1) : pp 113-30

Dates: Created 2007/03/13; Completed 2007/04/20;

PMID: 17352568, status: MEDLINE (last retrieved date: 2/18/2009)

Sourced from the National Library of Medicine. Abstract text and other information may be subject to copyright.

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