ERP Projects at MACCS
The effect of anxiety on processing faces
Christopher Sewell (Honours candidate)
In this project, I aim to expand current understanding of the mechanisms underlying perception of threatening stimuli by non-clinically anxious people. This procedure is designed to find out if people with different levels of anxiety have respond differently to attended and unattended threatening faces. This procedure uses a visual oddball task to measure the visual mismatch negativity (MMN) ERP.
Responses to faces by children, adolescents and adults
Dr Romina Palermo (MACCS Research Fellow)
A complex network of brain regions are involved in perceiving and recognising facial expressions. Some neural pathways and brain structures appear to process faces relatively automatically, whereas other brain areas seem to be involved when recognising and evaluating expressions. These brain regions mature with development. It is likely that the brain regions involved in automatic face processing mature earlier than those involved in conscious, voluntary processes. The aim of this research project is to examine both automatic and more elaborated processing of facial expressions at different stages of development to clarify whether there are differences in facial expression processing with age.
An ERP Study of Facial Expression Processing
The orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) is a region of the brain which occupies the ventral surface of the prefrontal cortex. Damage to this region has been associated with symptoms such as facial expression recognition deficits and socially inappropriate behaviour (e.g. Hornak et al., 1996). It is proposed that such symptoms may reflect a failure to alter behaviour in response to changing reinforcement contingencies (e.g. Rolls, 2004). An fMRI study conducted by Kringelbach and Rolls (2003) demonstrated increased activation of the lateral OFC when facial expressions were provided as cues to alter behaviour.
The aim of the present study is to use event-related potentials (ERPs) to investigate how facial expressions are processed when they are presented as cues to alter behavioural responses. In this study, participants will complete a computerised task, during which they will be required to monitor facial expressions and then use this information to guide their behavioural responses. The way in which different facial expressions modulate the amplitude and latency of specific ERP components may provide valuable insights into how processing of specific facial expressions influences our behaviour in social interactions.
The development of facial processing in children, adolescents and adults
I am visiting MACCS as part of a research project from Maastricht University in the Netherlands. After attaining my BSc (Psych) degree from Macquarie University in 2004, I travelled to Europe, working as a freelance writer. Having had my fill of fantasy, I commenced a MSc (Psych) programme at Maastricht University in the Netherlands in 2006. I am currently collaborating with Romina Palermo at MACCS as part of a research project investigating the development of facial processing in children, adolescents and adults. The research focuses on EEG and EMG data, and I am thrilled to have the opportunity to be working in the MACCS ERP lab.
