TY - JOUR
T1 - The real-time link between person perception and action
T2 - Brain potential evidence for dynamic continuity
AU - Freeman, Jonathan B.
AU - Ambady, Nalini
AU - Midgley, Katherine J.
AU - Holcomb, Phillip J.
N1 - Funding Information:
Correspondence should be addressed to: Jonathan B. Freeman, Department of Psychology, Tufts University, 490 Boston Avenue, Medford, MA 02155, USA. E-mail: [email protected] This research was funded by research grants NSF BCS-0435547 to NA and NIH-NICHD HD25889 to PJH. This research was part of a master’s thesis submitted by JBF to the Department of Psychology at Tufts University. We thank Janelle LaMarche, Jeffrey Brooks, Rebecca Sylvetsky, and Jordana Jacobs for their help in data collection.
PY - 2011/4
Y1 - 2011/4
N2 - Using event-related potentials, we investigated how the brain extracts information from another's face and translates it into relevant action in real time. In Study 1, participants made between-hand sex categorizations of sex-typical and sex-atypical faces. Sex-atypical faces evoked negativity between 250 and 550 ms (N300/N400 effects), reflecting the integration of accumulating sex-category knowledge into a coherent sex-category interpretation. Additionally, the lateralized readiness potential revealed that the motor cortex began preparing for a correct hand response while social category knowledge was still gradually evolving in parallel. In Study 2, participants made between-hand eye-color categorizations as part of go/no-go trials that were contingent on a target's sex. On no-go trials, although the hand did not actually move, information about eye color partially prepared the motor cortex to move the hand before perception of sex had finalized. Together, these findings demonstrate the dynamic continuity between person perception and action, such that ongoing results from face processing are immediately and continuously cascaded into the motor system over time. The preparation of action begins based on tentative perceptions of another's face before perceivers have finished interpreting what they just saw.
AB - Using event-related potentials, we investigated how the brain extracts information from another's face and translates it into relevant action in real time. In Study 1, participants made between-hand sex categorizations of sex-typical and sex-atypical faces. Sex-atypical faces evoked negativity between 250 and 550 ms (N300/N400 effects), reflecting the integration of accumulating sex-category knowledge into a coherent sex-category interpretation. Additionally, the lateralized readiness potential revealed that the motor cortex began preparing for a correct hand response while social category knowledge was still gradually evolving in parallel. In Study 2, participants made between-hand eye-color categorizations as part of go/no-go trials that were contingent on a target's sex. On no-go trials, although the hand did not actually move, information about eye color partially prepared the motor cortex to move the hand before perception of sex had finalized. Together, these findings demonstrate the dynamic continuity between person perception and action, such that ongoing results from face processing are immediately and continuously cascaded into the motor system over time. The preparation of action begins based on tentative perceptions of another's face before perceivers have finished interpreting what they just saw.
KW - Action
KW - ERPs
KW - Face perception
KW - Motor processes
KW - Person perception
KW - Social categorization
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U2 - 10.1080/17470919.2010.490674
DO - 10.1080/17470919.2010.490674
M3 - Article
C2 - 20602284
AN - SCOPUS:79952514284
SN - 1747-0919
VL - 6
SP - 139
EP - 155
JO - Social Neuroscience
JF - Social Neuroscience
IS - 2
ER -