Аннотация:Perception and recognition of facial expression were studied applying eye tracking technology. Three types of stimuli were used: (A) a set of photos of 2 male and 2 female faces each displaying six facial expressions (neutrality, anger, fear, disgust, happiness, sadness); and two sets of composite photos (B and C). To construct stimuli “B” the eyes on a photo displaying one of basic emotional expressions (anger, fear, disgust, happiness, or sadness) were replaced by the eyes from a photo of the same person posing neutrality. Stimuli “C” were composed in the same way from portraits displaying neutrality and eyes from photo of a person posing one of five emotional expressions.
The results show that there were no differences between photos “A” and “B” in expression recognition and in proportion of fixations on the various internal parts of the faces (eyes, nose, mouth, and forehead) except fear expression. A fearful face with neutral eyes was not perceived as fearful; a number of fixations on the eyes, nose and mouth increased; fixation durations became shorter. The facial expressions of photos “C” were described as “attention, concentration”, “contempt”, “distrust, skepticism” and rarely as “neutral expression”; the fixation time on the eyes area increased.