Executive control over the production of facial expressions of emotion

• Applicant: Guillermo Recio, Ph.D.
• Subject Area: General, Cognitive and Mathematical Psychology ; Social Psychology, Industrial and Organisational Psychology
• Term: from 2015 to 2018
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 273683025

Greeting a business partner with a smile, or withholding tears in the presence of strangers are examples for executive control over facial expressions during social communication. The proposed project aims to provide new insight into the mechanisms and neural underpinnings underlying the production and inhibition of facial expressions, an area of research with scarce empirical studies. Facial expressions are examined from the perspective of executive control, exploring behavioral and brain correlates with experimental designs that have previously shown consistent results for simple hand movements (e.g., go/no-go), while co-registering EEG and facial behaviour. In the center of interest are specifically functions of planning (preparing to produce an expression), inhibition (voluntary suppression), and switching from one expression to another. The project also investigates the impact of social context variables in the executive control over facial expressions.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants