Facial Emotion Recognition Task¶
HED Task ID: hedtsk_facial_emotion_recognition
Also known as: Ekman Faces Task, FER
Identification of an emotion category from a face image; accuracy and RT per emotion index emotion decoding ability.
Description¶
Participants view photographs of facial expressions (typically from the Ekman and Friesen Pictures of Facial Affect or similar validated sets) and identify the emotion portrayed. The standard set includes six basic emotions (anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, surprise) plus neutral. Accuracy and RT are measured across emotion categories. The task engages a network including the amygdala (particularly for fear), fusiform face area, superior temporal sulcus, and prefrontal cortex. It is widely used in clinical research on schizophrenia, autism, and mood disorders.
Inclusion test¶
Procedure |
Participants view face photographs displaying basic emotions and identify the expressed emotion from a fixed set (happy, sad, angry, fearful, disgusted, surprised, neutral). |
Manipulation |
Emotion category; expression intensity (morphed continua); presentation duration; face race/gender. |
Measurement |
Accuracy per emotion; confusion matrices; unbiased hit rate; RT. |
Variations¶
Variation |
Description |
Justification |
|---|---|---|
Static Ekman Faces (6 basic emotions) |
Standard categorization of anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, surprise. |
Canonical categorical recognition with posed expressions |
Morphed Intensity |
Expressions blended at different intensities (20%, 40%, 60%, 80%, 100%). |
Continuous emotion intensity gradient; participant categorizes or rates on morph scale |
Dynamic Expressions |
Video clips transitioning from neutral to full expression. |
Temporally unfolding expressions; different stimulus type with motion information |
Microexpression Detection |
Brief (40–200 ms) expression flashes; tests rapid perception. |
Very brief (~40 ms) expressions; different detection difficulty and timing |
Emotion-in-Context |
Faces presented with body posture and scene context. |
Body or scene context accompanies face; changes integration demands |
Expression Matching |
Match expression to labeled emotion or to another face. |
Match-to-sample format; different response structure from labeling |
Compound Expressions |
Faces showing mixed emotions (happy-surprise, angry-disgust). |
Blended or simultaneous multi-emotion displays; different stimulus category |
Dimensional Ratings |
Rating faces on continuous valence and arousal rather than category. |
Continuous valence/arousal ratings instead of categorical labels; different response type and scale |
Cognitive processes¶
This task engages the following cognitive processes:
Key references¶
{‘authors’: ‘Ekman, P., & Friesen, W. V.’, ‘year’: 1976, ‘title’: ‘Measuring facial movement’, ‘venue’: ‘Environmental Psychology and Nonverbal Behavior’, ‘venue_type’: ‘journal’, ‘journal’: ‘Environmental Psychology and Nonverbal Behavior’, ‘volume’: ‘1’, ‘issue’: ‘1’, ‘pages’: ‘56-75’, ‘doi’: ‘10.1007/bf01115465’, ‘openalex_id’: None, ‘pmid’: None, ‘citation_string’: ‘Ekman, P., & Friesen, W. V. (1976). Pictures of Facial Affect. Palo Alto, CA: Consulting Psychologists Press.’, ‘url’: ‘https://doi.org/10.1007/bf01115465’, ‘source’: ‘crossref’, ‘confidence’: ‘high’, ‘verified_on’: ‘2026-04-20’}
{‘authors’: ‘Adolphs, R., Tranel, D., Damasio, H., & Damasio, A.’, ‘year’: 1994, ‘title’: ‘Impaired recognition of emotion in facial expressions following bilateral damage to the human amygdala’, ‘venue’: ‘Nature’, ‘venue_type’: ‘journal’, ‘journal’: ‘Nature’, ‘volume’: ‘372’, ‘issue’: ‘6507’, ‘pages’: ‘669-672’, ‘doi’: ‘10.1038/372669a0’, ‘openalex_id’: None, ‘pmid’: None, ‘citation_string’: ‘Adolphs, R., Tranel, D., Damasio, H., & Damasio, A. (1994). Impaired recognition of emotion in facial expressions following bilateral damage to the human amygdala. Nature, 372(6507), 669-672.’, ‘url’: ‘https://doi.org/10.1038/372669a0’, ‘source’: ‘crossref’, ‘confidence’: ‘high’, ‘verified_on’: ‘2026-04-20’}
Recent references¶
{‘authors’: ‘Calvo, M., & Gutiérrez-García, A.’, ‘year’: 2016, ‘title’: ‘Cognition and Stress’, ‘venue’: ‘Stress: Concepts, Cognition, Emotion, and Behavior’, ‘venue_type’: ‘book_chapter’, ‘journal’: None, ‘volume’: ‘30’, ‘issue’: ‘6’, ‘pages’: ‘139-144’, ‘doi’: ‘10.1016/b978-0-12-800951-2.00016-9’, ‘openalex_id’: None, ‘pmid’: None, ‘citation_string’: ‘Calvo, M. G., & Nummenmaa, L. (2016). Perceptual and affective mechanisms in facial expression recognition: An integrative review. Cognition and Emotion, 30(6), 1081–1106.’, ‘url’: ‘https://doi.org/10.1016/b978-0-12-800951-2.00016-9’, ‘source’: ‘crossref’, ‘confidence’: ‘high’, ‘verified_on’: ‘2026-04-20’}
{‘authors’: ‘Kret, M., & De Gelder, B.’, ‘year’: 2012, ‘title’: ‘A review on sex differences in processing emotional signals’, ‘venue’: ‘Neuropsychologia’, ‘venue_type’: ‘journal’, ‘journal’: ‘Neuropsychologia’, ‘volume’: ‘50’, ‘issue’: ‘7’, ‘pages’: ‘1211-1221’, ‘doi’: ‘10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2011.12.022’, ‘openalex_id’: None, ‘pmid’: None, ‘citation_string’: ‘Kret, M. E., & De Gelder, B. (2012). A review on sex differences in processing emotional signals. Neuropsychologia, 50(7), 1211–1221.’, ‘url’: ‘https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2011.12.022’, ‘source’: ‘crossref’, ‘confidence’: ‘high’, ‘verified_on’: ‘2026-04-20’}
{‘authors’: ‘Dobs, K., Isik, L., Pantazis, D., & Kanwisher, N.’, ‘year’: 2019, ‘title’: ‘How face perception unfolds over time’, ‘venue’: ‘Nature Communications’, ‘venue_type’: ‘journal’, ‘journal’: ‘Nature Communications’, ‘volume’: ‘10’, ‘issue’: ‘1’, ‘pages’: None, ‘doi’: ‘10.1038/s41467-019-09239-1’, ‘openalex_id’: None, ‘pmid’: None, ‘citation_string’: ‘Dobs, K., Isik, L., Pantazis, D., & Kanwisher, N. (2019). How face perception unfolds over time. Nature Communications, 10(1), 1258.’, ‘url’: ‘https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-09239-1’, ‘source’: ‘crossref’, ‘confidence’: ‘high’, ‘verified_on’: ‘2026-04-20’}
{‘authors’: ‘Palermo, R., & Rhodes, G.’, ‘year’: 2007, ‘title’: ‘Are you always on my mind? A review of how face perception and attention interact’, ‘venue’: ‘Neuropsychologia’, ‘venue_type’: ‘journal’, ‘journal’: ‘Neuropsychologia’, ‘volume’: ‘45’, ‘issue’: ‘1’, ‘pages’: ‘75-92’, ‘doi’: ‘10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2006.04.025’, ‘openalex_id’: None, ‘pmid’: None, ‘citation_string’: ‘Palermo, R., & Rhodes, G. (2007). Are you always on my mind? A review of how face perception and attention interact. Neuropsychologia, 45(1), 75–92. [Updated: Barrett, L. F., Adolphs, R., Marsella, S., Martinez, A. M., & Pollak, S. D. (2019). Emotional expressions reconsidered: Challenges to inferring emotion from human facial movements. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 20(1), 1–68.]’, ‘url’: ‘https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2006.04.025’, ‘source’: ‘crossref’, ‘confidence’: ‘high’, ‘verified_on’: ‘2026-04-20’}