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Updated: Jul 17, 2026
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Conscious and Non-conscious Representations of Emotional Faces in Asperger's Syndrome
Published on: July 31, 2016
The face-specific N170 component is modulated by emotional facial expression
Vera C Blau1, Urs Maurer, Nim Tottenham
1Sackler Institute for Developmental Psychobiology, Weill Medical College of Cornell University, New York, USA. v.blau@psychology.unimaas.nl
Behavioral and Brain Functions : BBF
|January 25, 2007
Summary
Emotional facial expressions significantly impact the N170 event-related potential (ERP), challenging traditional face processing models. This early brain response to faces is influenced by emotion, not just structural encoding.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Cognitive Psychology
- Psychophysiology
Background:
- The traditional two-stage model posits N170 ERP reflects structural face encoding, with later components processing emotion.
- Recent findings suggest N170 is modulated by emotional facial expressions, challenging this model.
- This study investigates the temporal and spatial influence of emotional expression on the N170 face response.
Purpose of the Study:
- To examine the time-course and topography of emotional expression's influence on the N170.
- To determine if emotional modulation of N170 is robust against habituation.
- To test if N170 emotional modulation interacts with face gender or recording hemisphere.
Main Methods:
- Recorded dense-array event-related potentials (ERPs) to fear and neutral faces.
- Normalized stimuli for shape, size, and luminance contrast.
- Used an irrelevant learning task to minimize task-related confounds.
Main Results:
- N170 showed significant modulation by emotional facial expression.
- This effect was robust across the experiment, not due to habituation.
- Emotional modulation of N170 did not interact with face gender or hemisphere.
Conclusions:
- The N170 response to faces is influenced by emotional expressions.
- Fear stimuli appear to exaggerate the N170 response.
- Findings suggest N170 may involve early top-down modulation from emotional processing systems, not just structural analysis.
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