Decoders' processing of emotional facial expression — a top‐down or bottom‐up mechanism?

To date little evidence is available as to how emotional facial expression is decoded, specifically whether a bottom‐up (data‐driven) or a top‐down (schema‐driven) approach is more appropriate in explaining the decoding of emotions from facial expression. A study is reported (conducted with N = 20 subjects each in Germany and Italy), in which decoders judged emotions from photographs of facial expressions. Stimuli represented a selection of photographs depicting both single muscular movements (action units) in an otherwise neutral face, and combinations of such action units. Results indicate that the meaning of action units changes often with context; only a few single action units transmit specific emotional meaning, which they retain when presented in context. The results are replicated to a large degree across decoder samples in both nations, implying fundamental mechanisms of emotion decoding.