Neural Systems for the Extraction of Socially-Relevant Information from Faces

适当而有效的社交需要随时了解他人的个人特征、意图、目标、观点和心理状态。在国家科学基金会的资助下，詹姆斯·V·哈克斯比正在研究神经系统的功能组织，这种神经系统从面部和手势的感知中提取这些人的知识。这项实验使用功能磁共振成像(FMRI)、脑电(EEG)和其他方法来研究面孔知觉、动作知觉和模仿(镜像神经元，MN)和心理理论(TOM)的神经系统在从面孔获取社会信息方面所起的作用。这些信息可以是短暂的精神状态，如注意力方向、情绪状态和兴趣水平，也可以是更持久的属性，如个人特征、目标、态度和信念。一方面，对面部和社交手势的感知，以及对熟悉面孔的识别，被认为是由面孔和动作感知的神经系统的不同部分调节的。相比之下，一个共同的神经系统被假设用于表示人的知识，以调节在面孔感知过程中被激活的他人的瞬时心理状态和持久个人属性的表示。这些表征的系统被假设为与Tom联系在一起的相同系统，即表示他人精神状态的能力。实验的第一个目标是表征镜像神经元系统的功能组织，它在面部表情、社交手势和眼睛凝视的知觉中的作用，以及它在TOM系统中短暂心理状态表征的激活和更新中的作用。这一假设正在测试中，即对面部运动和手势的感知激活了镜像神经元网络(上颞沟、顶内沟和运动前区域，即布罗卡区和前额眼区)，感知和模仿都会引起这种活动；传达社会相关信息的动作也会引起TOM系统的活动。第二个目标是调查在熟悉面孔识别过程中被激活的哪些区域与自发提取与熟悉的个体相关的持久个人属性的表征有关。该假说认为这一过程是由TOM系统中的皮质区域(前副扣带回、后上颞沟)调节的，这些区域可以与情绪反应相关的区域(杏仁核)和自传体情景记忆的提取(后扣带回/楔前叶、前颞叶皮质)区分开来。还将研究通过操纵面孔的知觉来自动检索与熟悉面孔相关的人的知识。面孔感知是一种高度发展和有效的技能，在社会交流中发挥着核心作用。特别是，在传达关于他人的意图、态度、情绪、兴趣水平和其他短暂心理状态的信息方面，面孔感知可能比语言发挥更关键的作用。更好地理解调节这一技能的人类神经系统的功能架构，有助于为面孔感知的计算方法提供信息，并可能应用于改进人机界面。这种了解还有助于制定诊断程序和治疗以社交和面孔感知受损为特征的精神障碍，如社交恐惧症、自闭症和精神分裂症。普林斯顿大学的本科生和研究生将参与这项研究。

Appropriate and effective social interaction requires ready access to representations of the personal traits, intentions, goals, opinions, and mental states of others. With funding from the National Science Foundation, James V. Haxby is investigating the functional organization of neural systems that extract such person knowledge from the perception of faces and gestures. The proposed experiments use functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), electroencephalography (EEG), and other measures to investigate the roles played by neural systems for face perception, action perception and imitation (mirror neuron, MN), and theory of mind (ToM) in obtaining social information from faces. This information can be transient mental states, such as direction of attention, emotional state, and level of interest, or more enduring attributes, such as personal traits, goals, attitudes, and beliefs. Perception of facial and social gesture, on the one hand, and recognition of familiar faces, on the other, are hypothesized to be mediated by distinct parts of the neural systems for face and action perception. By contrast, a common neural system for the representation of person knowledge is hypothesized to mediate the representations of transient mental states and enduring personal attributes of others that are activated during face perception. The system for these representations is hypothesized to be the same system that has been associated with ToM, the ability to represent the mental states of others. The first objective of the experiments is to characterize the functional organization of the mirror neuron system, its role in the perception of facial expressions, social gestures, and eye gaze, and its role in the activation and updating of representations of transient mental states in the ToM system. The hypothesis is being tested that perception of facial movements and gestures activate mirror neuron networks (superior temporal sulcus, intraparietal sulcus, and premotor regions, namely Broca's area and the frontal eye fields)' that both perception and imitation evoke this activity; and that movements that convey socially-relevant information also will evoke activity in the ToM system. The second objective is to investigate which of the regions that are activated during the recognition of familiar faces are associated with the spontaneous retrieval of representations of the enduring personal attributes associated with familiar individuals. The hypothesis is being tested that this process is mediated by cortical areas in the ToM system (anterior paracingulate cortex, posterior superior temporal sulcus), and these areas can be distinguished from areas associated with emotional responses (amygdala) and the retrieval of autobiographical episodic memories (posterior cingulate/precuneus, anterior temporal cortex). Automaticity of retrieval of person knowledge associated with familiar faces by manipulating awareness of the faces will also be investigated.Face perception is a highly developed and efficient skill that plays a central role in social communication. In particular, face perception may play a more critical role than language in conveying information about the intentions, attitudes, emotions, level of interest, and other transient mental states of others. Better understanding of the functional architecture of the human neural systems that mediate this skill can help to inform computational approaches to face perception, with possible applications to improved human-computer interfaces. Such understanding can also help in the development of diagnostic procedures and therapies for psychiatric disorders characterized by impaired social communication and face perception, such as social phobia, autism, and schizophrenia. Undergraduate and graduate students at Princeton University will be involved in the research.