Effect of different emotional dimensions of emotional faces on time perception

Emotional effects on human time perception are generally attributed to arousal and valence of stimuli. Recent evidence suggests that perception of emotional facial expression induces temporal distortions. Based on the internal clock model, it is assumed that emotional arousal speeds up or slows down the pace maker, while valence influences the attentional processes of the switch element. The aim of our study was to investigate the contribution of each dimension and disentangle their role in facial emotion time distortion.

20 female students performed a temporal bisection task using emotional facial expressions as stimuli which were selected based on PAD model.

Behavioral results revealed that high arousal pleasant stimuli (happy faces) resulted in significantly smaller bisection point, while there was no significant difference between bisection points of angry and neutral faces. The results of study were interpreted in light of SET theory and dual-stages processing of attention.

Different Aspects of Facial Emotional affect on the Perception of Time