Fairness modulates non-conscious facial mimicry in women

Abstract

In societies with high cooperation demands, implicit consensus on social norms enables successful human coexistence. Mimicking other people's actions and emotions has been proposed as a means to synchronize behaviour, thereby enhancing affiliation. Mimicry has long been thought to be reflexive, but it has recently been suggested that mimicry might also be motivationally driven. Here, we show during an economic bargaining game that automatic happy mimicry of those making unfair offers disappears. After the bargaining game, when the proposers have acquired either a fair or unfair reputation, we observe increased angry mimicry of proposers with an unfair reputation and decreased angry mimicry of fair proposers. These findings provide direct empirical evidence that non-conscious mimicry is modulated by fairness. We interpret the present results as reflecting that facial mimicry in women functions conditionally, dependent on situational demands.

Social Context Modulates Facial Imitation of Children’s Emotional Expressions

“…Nonetheless, the underlying motives of participants were not addressed in this study, and our functional interpretation of altered corrugator responses towards angry and sad faces should therefore be empirically tested in future research. We base our interpretations on research showing that corrugator responses towards sadness inducing stimuli are predictive of empathic behavior [20], whereas similar corrugator responses towards angry faces have been observed after unfair versus fair opponents in a trust game [23]. However, irrespective of the underlying motive of the sender, research on the socialization of children clearly demonstrates that emotional expressions of caregivers are important in guiding their behavior [8].…”

“…Increased corrugator supercilii activation towards angry children of which observers have learned that they behave negatively could serve as a corrective or punitive signal, similar to increased corrugator supercilii activation observed towards adults after being treated unfair [23]. In contrast, increased activation of the corrugator supercilii towards sad faces is more likely to signal empathy, which is reflected in increased activation of this muscle towards sad children displaying positive compared to negative behavior, an interpretation in line with earlier observations [22].…”

“…Sample size was determined based on our previous work in which a small final sample of N = 26 yielded a significant effect of context manipulation in a similar setup [23]. Since small samples can lead to exaggerated estimates of effect size, in the present study we increased our sample to n = 40.…”

“…For example, in competitive situations angry facial expressions may not be mimicked by the observer, since an angry opponent can indicate an advantage for the observer thus reflecting a ‘positive’ signal resulting in relaxation of the corrugator supercilii [10]. However, angry facial mimicry is enhanced in a situation when treated unfair by others, whereas the opposite effect is shown after a fair treatment by others [23]. Such increased angry facial response to unfair others might serve as a corrective signal to enforce norm compliance.…”

Convergence of physiological responses to pain during face-to-face interaction

“…One possible process that can mediate physiological convergence is spontaneous mimicry. Pain is often expressed in facial reactions 38 , and observation of emotional faces activates relevant facial muscles 20,22,23 . Pupil dilation and blink reflex also reflect arousal change due to painful stimulus 39,40 , possibly causing spontaneous mimicry of pupil size 21 among observers.…”