A neural marker of rapid discrimination of facial expression in 3.5 and 7-month-old infants

Little is known about infants' ability to rapidly discriminate a facial expression against many others. Here, we investigated the development of facial expression discrimination in infancy with fast periodic visual stimulation coupled with scalp electroencephalography (EEG). EEG was recorded in 3.5- and 7-month-old infants (n=18 per group) displayed with an expressive (disgust or happy) or neutral female face at a base stimulation frequency of 6 Hz. Pictures of the same individual randomly expressing other expressions (either anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, or neutrality) were introduced every 6 stimuli (i.e., at 6/6 = 1 Hz) to directly isolate a discrimination response between th…

Maternal odor selectively enhances rapid face categorization from natural images in the 4-month-old infant brain

Maternal odor selectively enhances the categorization of face(like) stimuli in the 4 month-old infant brain

Présentation Poster; International audience; In the 4-month-old infant brain, the visual categorization of natural face images is enhanced by concomitant maternal odor (Leleu et al., 2019), providing support for the early perception of congruent associations between co-occurring inputs from multiple senses. Here, we further explore whether this maternal odor effect is selective to faces or if it can be explained by a more general influence of salient odor cues on the perception of any visual object category. In Experiment 1, scalp electroencephalogram was recorded during a fast periodic visual stimulation (FPVS-EEG) while 4-month-old infants were exposed to the maternal vs. a control odor. …

Maternal odor shapes face categorization in the 4-month-old infant brain

Development of face pareidolia in objects in 3- to 6-month-old infants

Discrimination des expressions faciales et environnement olfactif - Corrélats cérébraux en électroencéphalographie (EEG) chez l'adulte et le très jeune enfant

This thesis examines the mechanisms subtending the perception of emotional facial expressions and their early development using a Fast Periodic Visual Presentation (FPVS) approach coupled with electroencephalography (EEG). More specifically, we tried to characterize brain responses reflecting facial expression discrimination and to determine whether hedonic odor contexts influence these responses in adults (studies 1 and 2), and in infants at different developmental stages (studies 3 and 4). We showed specific responses to the discrimination of every facial expression in the adult brain, indicating rapid and automatic categorization of basic facial expressions (study 1). In addition, we rev…

Discrimination des expressions faciales et environnement olfactif – Corrélats cérébraux en électroencéphalographie (EEG) chez l’adulte et le très jeune enfant

This thesis examines the mechanisms subtending the perception of emotional facial expressions and their early development using a Fast Periodic Visual Presentation (FPVS) approach coupled with electroencephalography (EEG). More specifically, we tried to characterize brain responses reflecting facial expression discrimination and to determine whether hedonic odor contexts influence these responses in adults (studies 1 and 2), and in infants at different developmental stages (studies 3 and 4).We showed specific responses to the discrimination of every facial expression in the adult brain, indicating rapid and automatic categorization of basic facial expressions (study 1). In addition, we reve…

Maternal odor selectively enhances the categorization of face(like) stimuli in the 4-month-old infant brain

In the 4-month-old infant brain, the visual categorization of natural face images is enhanced by concomitant maternal odor (Leleu et al., 2019), providing support for the early perception of congruent associations between co-occurring inputs from multiple senses. Here, we further explore whether this maternal odor effect is selective to faces or if it can be explained by a more general influence of salient odor cues on the perception of any visual object category. In Experiment 1, scalp electroencephalogram was recorded during a fast periodic visual stimulation (FPVS-EEG) while 4-month-old infants were exposed to the maternal vs. a control odor. In rapid 6-Hz streams of natural images (i.e.…