A Communication Approach to Understanding Rapid Responses to Others: The Importance of Flexibility Across Goal Conditions

Two studies evaluated the communication approach to rapid display responses (RDRs) to others by 1) examining the influence of specific communicative goals on RDRs and, 2) identifying the social outcomes associated with correspondence between communicative goals and responses. Both studies showed that people in general can change the magnitude of their most rapid responses according to communication goals to either respond or suppress responses. For some stimulus-response pairs, the ability to flexibly deploy RDRs to align with goals is associated with positive social outcomes for those who are socially active. In Study 1, individual differences among socially active first-year college students\u27 ability to flexibly deploy RDRs across communicative contexts predicted social adjustment. When the goal was to respond, those who were better at enhancing their smiling response to a smiling face reported better social adjustment compared to those who were not as successful at enhancing their smile. Study 2 showed that adults\u27 ability to suppress fearful responses to angry displays was associated with better social adjustment in the wake of a stressful event. This ability was also associated with reduced depressive symptoms through its effect on social adjustment. As in Study 1, the relationship between RDR flexibility and social adjustment was especially strong for those who were socially active. These findings provide support for a communicative mechanism by which displays elicit RDRs and suggest that the ability to modify rapid responses to match communicative goals has consequences for longer-term social adjustment and even mental wellbeing

Relative Contributions of Face and Body Configurations: Perceiving Emotional State and Motion Intention

This study addressed the relative reliance on face and body configurations for different types of emotion-related judgements: emotional state and motion intention. Participants viewed images of people with either emotionally congruent (both angry or fearful) or incongruent (angry/fearful; fearful/angry) faces and bodies. Congruent conditions provided baseline responses. Incongruent conditions revealed relative reliance on face and body information for different judgements. Body configurations influenced motion-intention judgements more than facial configurations: incongruent pairs with angry bodies were more frequently perceived as moving forward than those with fearful bodies; pairs with fearful bodies were more frequently perceived as moving away. In contrast, faces influenced emotional-state judgements more, but bodies moderated ratings of face emotion. Thus, both face and body configurations influence emotion perception, but the type of evaluation required influences their relative contributions. These findings highlight the importance of considering both the face and body as important sources of emotion information

Nonverbal Channel Use in Communication of Emotion: How May Depend on Why

This study investigated the hypothesis that different emotions are most effectively conveyed through specific, nonverbal channels of communication: body, face, and touch. Experiment 1 assessed the production of emotion displays. Participants generated nonverbal displays of 11 emotions, with and without channel restrictions. For both actual production and stated preferences, participants favored the body for embarrassment, guilt, pride, and shame; the face for anger, disgust, fear, happiness, and sadness; and touch for love and sympathy. When restricted to a single channel, participants were most confident about their communication when production was limited to the emotion\u27s preferred channel. Experiment 2 examined the reception or identification of emotion displays. Participants viewed videos of emotions communicated in unrestricted and restricted conditions and identified the communicated emotions. Emotion identification in restricted conditions was most accurate when participants viewed emotions displayed via the emotion\u27s preferred channel. This study provides converging evidence that some emotions are communicated predominantly through different nonverbal channels. Further analysis of these channel-emotion correspondences suggests that the social function of an emotion predicts its primary channel: The body channel promotes social-status emotions, the face channel supports survival emotions, and touch supports intimate emotions