Feelings first? Sex differences in affective and cognitive processes in emotion recognition

Abstract

The recognition of emotional expressions is important for social understanding and interaction, but findings on the relationship between emotion recognition, empathy and theory of mind, as well as sex differences in these relationships, have been inconsistent. This may reflect the relative involvement of affective and cognitive processes at different stages of emotion recognition and in different experimental paradigms. In the present study, images of faces morphed from neutral to full expression of five basic emotions (anger, disgust, fear, happiness, and sadness), which participants were asked to identify as quickly and accurately as possible. Accuracy and response times from healthy males (N=46) and females (N=43) were analysed in relation to the Empathy Quotient (EQ; Baron-Cohen & Wheelwright, 2004) and the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (Eyes Test; Baron-Cohen et al., 2001) as a measure of mentalising or theory of mind. Females were faster and more accurate than males in recognising dynamic emotions. Linear mixed-effects modelling showed that response times were inversely related to the emotional empathy subscale of the EQ, but this was accounted for by a female advantage on both measures. Accuracy was unrelated to EQ scores but was predicted independently by sex and Eyes Test scores. These findings suggest that rapid processing of dynamic emotional expressions is strongly influenced by sex, which may reflect the greater involvement of affective processes at earlier stages of emotion recognition.

Emotional recognition across the adult lifespan: Effects of age, sex, cognitive empathy, alexithymia traits, and amygdala subnuclei volumes

“…Females and males use different strategies during emotional processing tasks: while males recruit cognitive-related neural networks, females show neural activation in emotional-related areas (Derntl et al, 2010). A recent study showed that the sex differences in empathy were associated with sex differences in emotional processing: Females scored higher than male in affective empathy, but not cognitive empathy; these sex differences in affective empathy could explain shorter female reaction times in emotion recognition tasks (Bek et al, 2022). Thus, it is reasonable to speculate that the lack of association between RMET and emotional recognition in females could be due to the impact of higher affective empathy predisposition, which can compensate for lower levels of theory-of-mind capability in processing others' emotions.…”

Emotional anticipation for dynamic emotional faces is not modulated by schizotypal traits: A Representational Momentum study

“…All covariates were mean centred. Moreover, since there is an implicit effect of face gender in emotion perception (e.g., Becker et al, 2007;Hess et al, 2009) and a women advantage in recognizing emotional faces (e.g., Bek et al, 2022), two exploratory repeatedmeasures ANOVA with Emotion (within-subjects factor) were conducted to test the effects of Avatar Sex (within-subjects factor) and Participant Sex (between-subjects factor).…”

Evidence for a multidimensional account of cognitive and affective theory of mind: A state-trace analysis

“…One possible key driver of the distinction between cognitive and affective ToM processes could be that emotion perception is more closely associated with affective than cognitive ToM. Emotion perception involves the ability to accurately read information about the emotional state of someone through verbal, bodily, and facial cues and is suggested to recruit partially distinct brain regions to cognitive and affective ToM (Bek et al, 2021 ; Mitchell & Phillips, 2015 ). Studies have shown that emotion perception performance is significantly correlated with affective ToM performance only (Bek et al, 2021 ; Henry et al, 2006 ).…”

“…Emotion perception involves the ability to accurately read information about the emotional state of someone through verbal, bodily, and facial cues and is suggested to recruit partially distinct brain regions to cognitive and affective ToM (Bek et al, 2021 ; Mitchell & Phillips, 2015 ). Studies have shown that emotion perception performance is significantly correlated with affective ToM performance only (Bek et al, 2021 ; Henry et al, 2006 ). However, it is currently unclear whether this correlation is due to shared emotion perception functions or due to similarities in task demands (i.e., identifying complex affective states versus basic emotions from face or eye region images; Bek et al, 2021 ; Henry et al, 2006 ).…”

“…Studies have shown that emotion perception performance is significantly correlated with affective ToM performance only (Bek et al, 2021 ; Henry et al, 2006 ). However, it is currently unclear whether this correlation is due to shared emotion perception functions or due to similarities in task demands (i.e., identifying complex affective states versus basic emotions from face or eye region images; Bek et al, 2021 ; Henry et al, 2006 ).…”