Unmasking the psychology of recognizing emotions of people wearing masks: The role of empathizing, systemizing, and autistic traits

Ramachandra, Vijayachandra; Longacre, Hannah

doi:10.1016/j.paid.2021.111249

Cited by 34 publications

(48 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…We know from research during the COVID-19 pandemic that adults ( Carbon, 2020 ) as well as (9–11 year old) children ( Carbon and Serrano, 2021 ) are less effective in reading emotions when face masks cover a target’s mouth and nose region. These general findings were replicated several times in 2020 (e.g., Gori et al, 2021 ; Grundmann et al, 2021 ) and 2021 ( Ramachandra and Longacre, 2022 ). Specific emotions are especially difficult to discern when face masks are worn.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 58%

Reading Emotions in Faces With and Without Masks Is Relatively Independent of Extended Exposure and Individual Difference Variables

2022

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The ability to read emotions in faces helps humans efficiently assess social situations. We tested how this ability is affected by aspects of familiarization with face masks and personality, with a focus on emotional intelligence (measured with an ability test, the MSCEIT, and a self-report scale, the SREIS). To address aspects of the current pandemic situation, we used photos of not only faces per se but also of faces that were partially covered with face masks. The sample (N = 49), the size of which was determined by an a priori power test, was recruited in Germany and consisted of healthy individuals of different ages [M = 24.8 (18–64) years]. Participants assessed the emotional expressions displayed by six different faces determined by a 2 (sex) × 3 (age group: young, medium, and old) design. Each person was presented with six different emotional displays (angry, disgusted, fearful, happy, neutral, and sad) with or without a face mask. Accuracy and confidence were lower with masks—in particular for the emotion disgust (very often misinterpreted as anger) but also for happiness, anger, and sadness. When comparing the present data collected in July 2021 with data from a different sample collected in May 2020, when people first started to familiarize themselves with face masks in Western countries during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, we did not detect an improvement in performance. There were no effects of participants’ emotional intelligence, sex, or age regarding their accuracy in assessing emotional states in faces for unmasked or masked faces.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 58%

Reading Emotions in Faces With and Without Masks Is Relatively Independent of Extended Exposure and Individual Difference Variables

2022

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“…It is possible that the selective impairment in processing masked emotions may be related to certain individual differences. As some literature suggests, reading emotions from isolated face regions may be specifically impaired in some populations (e.g., autistic - Baron-Cohen et al 1997b;Pazhoohi et al, 2021;Ramachandra & Longacre, 2022). Possibly, occluding mouth regions may be disadvantageous for individuals with specific traits.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A similar study, this time with medical students, showed that students made more errors when faces were presented with face masks for emotions of happiness, anger, sadness but not for fear (Bani et al, 2021). Yet, in another study (Ramachandra & Longacre, 2022), half of the participants were shown pictures of the whole face of a woman and the other half was shown only the eyes of the same woman expressing the same emotions (similar to a mask covering the mouth). The results revealed a significant difference in emotion recognition between facial vs. eyes conditions for all emotions except sadness and distress.…”

Section: Significance Statementmentioning

confidence: 92%

“…Besides, people with difficulties in emotional processing such as those with high functioning autism or Asperger syndrome were found to have impaired emotion recognition from the eyes alone more than other populations , Wheelwright, & Jolliffe , 1997b). More recent studies showed that higher degree of autistic traits predicted a greater difficulty in recognizing emotions both with and without masks (Pazhoohi et al, 2021;Ramachandra & Longacre, 2022). Anxiety was also found to be related to altered emotional recognition, so that individuals with high-trait anxiety were shown to identify fear significantly better.…”

Section: Emotion Recognition: Effects Of Mask Patterns and Colormentioning

confidence: 96%

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Masked Emotions: Do Face Mask Patterns and Colors Affect the Recognition of Emotions?

Blazhenkova¹,

Dogerlioglu-Demir²

2021

Preprint

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Previous research has shown that face masks restrain the ability to perceive social information and readability of emotions. These studies mostly explored the effect of standard medical, often white masks on emotion recognition. However, in reality, many individuals prefer masks with different styles. We investigated whether the appearance of the mask (pattern-angular vs. curvy and color-black vs. white) affected the recognition of emotional states. Participants were asked to identify the emotions on faces covered by masks with different designs. The presence of masks impeded emotional recognition, dropping the accuracy and confidence and increasing reaction times. There were no main effects of angularity vs. curvature or color on emotion recognition, which suggests that mask design may not impair the recognition beyond the effect of mere mask wearing. Besides, we found relationships between individual difference variables such as mask wearing attitudes, mask design preferences, individual traits and emotional recognition. The majority of participants demonstrated positive attitudes towards mask wearing and preferred non-patterned black and white masks. Preferences for white masks were associated with better emotional recognition of masked faces. In contrast, those with negative attitudes towards masks showed lower performance in emotional recognition for masked faces, preferring patterned more than plain masks, perhaps viewing masks as a fashion item rather than a necessity. Moreover, preferences to wear patterned masks were negatively related to actual wearing masks indoors and perceived risks of COVID.

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“…A similar study, this time with medical students, showed that students made more errors when faces were presented with face masks for emotions of happiness, anger, and sadness, but not for fear (Bani et al, 2021 ). Yet, in another study (Ramachandra & Longacre, 2022 ), half of the participants were shown pictures of the whole face of a woman and the other half was shown only the eyes of the same woman expressing the same emotions (similar to a mask covering the mouth). The results revealed a significant difference in emotion recognition between full face versus eyes conditions for all emotions except sadness and distress.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Masked emotions: Do face mask patterns and colors affect the recognition of emotions?

2022

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Previous research has shown that face masks impair the ability to perceive social information and the readability of emotions. These studies mostly explored the effect of standard medical, often white, masks on emotion recognition. However, in reality, many individuals prefer masks with different styles. We investigated whether the appearance of the mask (pattern: angular vs. curvy and color: black vs. white) affected the recognition of emotional states. Participants were asked to identify the emotions on faces covered by masks with different designs. The presence of masks resulted in decreasing accuracy and confidence and increasing reaction times, indicating that masks impair emotion recognition. There were no significant effects of angularity versus curvature or color on emotion recognition, which suggests that mask design may not impair the recognition beyond the effect of mere mask wearing. Besides, we found relationships between individual difference variables such as mask wearing attitudes, mask design preferences, individual traits and emotion recognition. The majority of participants demonstrated positive attitudes toward mask wearing and preferred non-patterned black and white masks. Preferences for white masks were associated with better emotion recognition of masked faces. In contrast, those with negative attitudes toward masks showed marginally poorer performance in emotion recognition for masked faces, and preferred patterned more than plain masks, perhaps viewing masks as a fashion item rather than a necessity. Moreover, preferences to wear patterned masks were negatively related to actual wearing of masks indoors and perceived risks of COVID.

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Unmasking the psychology of recognizing emotions of people wearing masks: The role of empathizing, systemizing, and autistic traits

Cited by 34 publications

References 32 publications

Reading Emotions in Faces With and Without Masks Is Relatively Independent of Extended Exposure and Individual Difference Variables

Reading Emotions in Faces With and Without Masks Is Relatively Independent of Extended Exposure and Individual Difference Variables

Masked Emotions: Do Face Mask Patterns and Colors Affect the Recognition of Emotions?

Masked emotions: Do face mask patterns and colors affect the recognition of emotions?

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