The inherently contextualized nature of facial emotion perception.

According to mainstream views of emotion perception, facial expressions are powerful signals conveying specific emotional states. This approach, which endorsed the use of stereotypical-posed faces as stimuli, has typically ignored the role of context in emotion perception. We argue that this methodological tradition is flawed.

Are you looking at me? Mu suppression modulation by facial expression direction.

Although we encounter numerous expressive faces on a daily basis, those that are not aimed at us will often be disregarded. Facial expressions aimed at our direction appear far more relevant and evoke an engaging affective experience, while the exact same expressions aimed away from us may not. While the importance of expression directionality is intuitive and commonplace, the neural mechanisms underlying this phenomenon are largely unknown.