Wearing mask hinders emotion recognition, but enhances perception of attractiveness

Parada-Fernández, Pamela; Herrero-Fernández, David; Jorge, Richard; Comesaña, Patricia Comesaña

doi:10.1016/j.paid.2021.111195

Cited by 41 publications

(57 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…The mouth region plays a critical role in expressing (and thus eventually perceiving) happy faces, while the contribution of the mouth region to expressing other emotional faces vary among previous studies ( Boucher & Ekman, 1975 ; Calder et al, 2000 ; Calvo et al, 2014 ; Eisenbarth & Alpers, 2011 ; Hanawalt, 1944 ; Kotsia et al, 2008 ; Saumure et al, 2018 ; Schurgin et al, 2014 ). Consistent with these findings, previous studies have reported that the recognition of happy faces is impaired by mask-wearing ( Carbon, 2020 ; Grenville & Dwyer, 2022 ; Kim et al, 2022 ; Marini et al, 2021 ; Noyes et al, 2021 ; Parada-Fernández et al, 2022 ; Pazhoohi et al, 2021 ; Ramachandra & Longacre, 2022 ).…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 85%

“…While mask-wearing is effective in controlling infection, many researchers have pointed to its negative side effects in interpersonal situations due to the partial occlusion of critical parts of the face. The occlusion significantly impairs recognition of facial emotions ( Carbon, 2020 ; Gori et al, 2021 ; Grenville & Dwyer, 2022 ; Grundmann et al, 2021 ; Kim et al, 2022 ; Marini et al, 2021 ; Noyes et al, 2021 ; Parada-Fernández et al, 2022 ; Pazhoohi et al, 2021 ; Ramachandra & Longacre, 2022 ) and perception of facial emotion intensity ( Pazhoohi et al, 2021 ; Ramachandra & Longacre, 2022 ; Sheldon et al, 2021 ; Tsantani et al, 2022 ). These negative effects on emotional facial communication occur because the features of the bottom half of the faces that signal effective cues for reading others’ facial expressions ( Blais et al, 2012 ; Bombari et al, 2013 ; Boucher & Ekman, 1975 ; Calder et al, 2000 ; Calvo et al, 2014 ; Eisenbarth & Alpers, 2011 ; Hanawalt, 1944 ; Kotsia et al, 2008 ; Saumure et al, 2018 ; Schurgin et al, 2014 ; Schyns et al, 2002 ; Wegrzyn et al, 2017 ) are occluded by the masks.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Effects of wearing a transparent face mask on perception of facial expressions

et al. 2022

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Wearing face masks in public has become the norm in many countries post-2020. Although mask-wearing is effective in controlling infection, it has the negative side effect of occluding the mask wearer’s facial expressions. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of wearing transparent masks on the perception of facial expressions. Participants were required to categorize the perceived facial emotion of female (Experiment 1) and male (Experiment 2) faces with different facial expressions and to rate the perceived emotion intensity of the faces. Based on the group, the participants were assigned to, the faces were presented with a surgical mask, a transparent mask, or without a mask. The results showed that wearing a surgical mask impaired the performance of reading facial expressions, both with respect to recognition and perceived intensity of facial emotions. Specifically, the impairments were robustly observed in fear and happy faces for emotion recognition, and in happy faces for perceived intensity of emotion in Experiments 1 and 2. However, the impairments were moderated by wearing a transparent mask instead of a surgical mask. During the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, the transparent mask can be used in a range of situations where face-to-face communication is important.

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Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 85%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of wearing a transparent face mask on perception of facial expressions

et al. 2022

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“…For these reasons, it is highly likely that wearing a face mask during social interactions could reasonably interfere with specific mechanisms involved in face processing. Supporting evidence to this notion comes from recent studies showing reduction in both identity recognition (e.g., Freud et al, 2020;Noyes et al, 2021; for other related evidence see also Giovanelli et al, 2021) and emotion recognition (e.g., Carbon, 2020;Marini et al, 2021;Nestor et al, 2020;Parada-Fernández et al, 2022) of faces wearing a face mask. Howeverto the best of our knowledgeso far, no studies investigated the potential impact of face masks on social attention.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 85%

Face Masks Do Not Alter Gaze Cueing of Attention: Evidence From the COVID-19 Pandemic

Dalmaso

Zhang

Galfano³

et al. 2021

i-Perception

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Interacting with others wearing a face mask has become a regular worldwide practice since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the impact of face masks on cognitive mechanisms supporting social interaction is still largely unexplored. In the present work, we focused on gaze cueing of attention, a phenomenon tapping the essential ability which allows individuals to orient their attentional resources in response to eye gaze signals coming from others. Participants from both a European (i.e., Italy; Experiment 1) and an Asian (i.e., China; Experiment 2) country were involved, namely two countries in which the daily use of face masks before COVID-19 pandemic was either extremely uncommon or frequently adopted, respectively. Both samples completed a task in which a peripheral target had to be discriminated while a task irrelevant averted gaze face, wearing a mask or not, acted as a central cueing stimulus. Overall, a reliable and comparable gaze cueing emerged in both experiments, independent of the mask condition. These findings suggest that gaze cueing of attention is preserved even when the person perceived is wearing a face mask.

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“…However, facemasks vary by type (Goh et al, 2020;Van Gorp, 2021), and different facemasks evoke different associations (Tateo, 2020). Quantitative research on the interpersonal effects of facemasks has thus far focused on surgical (or medical) facemasks (Cartaud et al, 2020;Fitousi et al, 2021;Grundmann et al, 2021;Kastendieck et al, 2021;Klucarova, 2021;Parada-Fernández et al, 2022;Rosa et al, 2020;Wu, Liang, et al, 2021), a type of facemask traditionally used to stop bacteria transmission in medical settings (Goh et al, 2020). For example, in two papers, faces with a surgical facemask were rated as more trustworthy in comparison to faces with a neutral emotional expression, whether these faces were of virtual characters (Cartaud et al, 2020) or real-life individuals (Olivera-La .…”

Section: Interpersonal Perceptions Of Wearers Of Different Facemasksmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…With the continuous mutation of the virus, protective measures such as facemask wearing are potentially here to stay (British Academy, 2021). Accordingly, research and theory concerning the psychological effects of facemask exposure (Biermann et al, 2021;Cartaud et al, 2020;Fitousi et al, 2021;Grundmann et al, 2021;Kastendieck et al, 2021;Klucarova, 2021;Parada-Fernández et al, 2022;Rosa et al, 2020;Wu, Liang, et al, 2021) and the associations attached to facemasks in general (Cheng et al, 2020;Huang et al, 2021;Ji, 2020;Timpka & Nyce, 2021) and to specific types (e.g., surgical) of facemasks (Goh et al, 2020;Klucarova, 2021;Mokdad, 2021;Perach, 2020;Tateo, 2020) are emerging. In this paper, we propose that exposure to facemasks with a cultural symbol that relates to solidarity can activate cultural values such as mutual trust and thereby increase interpersonal perceptions compatible with these values (Neville et al, 2021;Vail et al, 2012).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Can culture beat Covid-19? Evidence that exposure to facemasks with cultural symbols increases solidarity

Perach¹,

Limbu²

2022

Preprint

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Facemasks have become integral to everyday life. We propose that exposure to facemasks with a solidarity-related cultural symbol can activate cultural values such as mutual trust and increase corresponding interpersonal perceptions, thereby enhancing collective resilience in the Covid-19 pandemic. In three (two of which preregistered) studies, we examined whether exposure to facemasks with a solidarity-related cultural symbol predicts positive interpersonal perceptions, and whether this depends on death awareness. Across studies, exposure to facemasks with a cultural symbol (either pride flag or National Health Service) increased positive interpersonal perceptions, an index of solidarity, in people for whom this symbol represents a meaningful social identity. This was found whether participants were reminded of death, a neutral experience, or a negative experience. Importantly, in Study 3, exposure to facemasks with a solidarity-related cultural symbol (vs. surgical) led to greater increases in positive interpersonal perceptions when death awareness was high. Together, our findings suggest that wearing facemasks with a cultural symbol that relates to solidarity can be a vehicle for shaping people’s personality impressions of others. Applied directions for the activation of people’s social identities via facemask selection to promote collective resilience in the Covid-19 pandemic are discussed.

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Wearing mask hinders emotion recognition, but enhances perception of attractiveness

Cited by 41 publications

References 42 publications

Effects of wearing a transparent face mask on perception of facial expressions

Effects of wearing a transparent face mask on perception of facial expressions

Face Masks Do Not Alter Gaze Cueing of Attention: Evidence From the COVID-19 Pandemic

Can culture beat Covid-19? Evidence that exposure to facemasks with cultural symbols increases solidarity

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