Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Faculty & Research
  • Faculty
  • Research
  • Featured Topics
  • Academic Units
  • …→
  • Harvard Business School→
  • Faculty & Research→
Publications
Publications
  • October 2022
  • Article
  • Nature Human Behaviour

Amplification in the Evaluation of Multiple Emotional Expressions over Time

By: Amit Goldenberg, Jonas Schöne, Zi Huang, Timothy D. Sweeny, Desmond C. Ong, Timothy Brady, Maria M. Robinson, David Levari, Jamil Zaki and James J. Gross
  • Format:Print
  • | Pages:9
ShareBar

Abstract

Social interactions are dynamic and unfold over time. To make sense of social interactions, people must aggregate sequential information into summary, global evaluations. But how do people do this? Here, to address this question, we conducted nine studies (N = 1,583) using a diverse set of stimuli. Our focus was a central aspect of social interaction—namely, the evaluation of others’ emotional responses. The results suggest that when aggregating sequences of images and videos expressing varying degrees of emotion, perceivers overestimate the sequence’s average emotional intensity. This tendency for overestimation is driven by stronger memory of more emotional expressions. A computational model supports this account and shows that amplification cannot be explained only by nonlinear perception of individual exemplars. Our results demonstrate an amplification effect in the perception of sequential emotional information, which may have implications for the many types of social interactions that involve repeated emotion estimation.

Keywords

Social Interactions; Facial Expressions; Emotions; Behavior; Perception

Citation

Goldenberg, Amit, Jonas Schöne, Zi Huang, Timothy D. Sweeny, Desmond C. Ong, Timothy Brady, Maria M. Robinson, David Levari, Jamil Zaki, and James J. Gross. "Amplification in the Evaluation of Multiple Emotional Expressions over Time." Nature Human Behaviour 6, no. 10 (October 2022): 1408–1416.
  • Find it at Harvard
  • Read Now

About The Author

Amit Goldenberg

Negotiation, Organizations & Markets
→More Publications

More from the Authors

    • March 2025
    • Faculty Research

    Intuition Robotics: An AI Companion for Older Adults (B)

    By: Amit Goldenberg, Elie Ofek and Orna Dan
    • February 2025
    • Faculty Research

    Slice Labs: Creating a Fraud-Free Online Insurance Platform

    By: Amit Goldenberg, Max Bazerman and Ruth Page
    • February 2025
    • Faculty Research

    Slice Labs: Creating a Fraud-Free Online Insurance Platform (B)

    By: Amit Goldenberg, Max Bazerman and Ruth Page
More from the Authors
  • Intuition Robotics: An AI Companion for Older Adults (B) By: Amit Goldenberg, Elie Ofek and Orna Dan
  • Slice Labs: Creating a Fraud-Free Online Insurance Platform By: Amit Goldenberg, Max Bazerman and Ruth Page
  • Slice Labs: Creating a Fraud-Free Online Insurance Platform (B) By: Amit Goldenberg, Max Bazerman and Ruth Page
ǁ
Campus Map
Harvard Business School
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
→Map & Directions
→More Contact Information
  • Make a Gift
  • Site Map
  • Jobs
  • Harvard University
  • Trademarks
  • Policies
  • Accessibility
  • Digital Accessibility
Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College.