Elsevier

NeuroImage

Volume 226, 1 February 2021, 117572
NeuroImage

Facial and neural mechanisms during interactive disclosure of biographical information

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2020.117572Get rights and content
Under a Creative Commons license
open access

Highlights

  • Face-to-face communication modulates the use of social signals.

  • Face-to-face communication recruits bilateral TPJ and left dlPFC.

  • Cross-brain synchrony between right TPJ - left dlPFC increases during communication.

Abstract

Pairs of participants mutually communicated (or not) biographical information to each other. By combining simultaneous eye-tracking, face-tracking and functional near-infrared spectroscopy, we examined how this mutual sharing of information modulates social signalling and brain activity. When biographical information was disclosed, participants directed more eye gaze to the face of the partner and presented more facial displays. We also found that spontaneous production and observation of facial displays was associated with activity in the left SMG and right dlPFC/IFG, respectively. Moreover, mutual information-sharing increased activity in bilateral TPJ and left dlPFC, as well as cross-brain synchrony between right TPJ and left dlPFC. This suggests that a complex long-range mechanism is recruited during information-sharing. These multimodal findings support the second-person neuroscience hypothesis, which postulates that communicative interactions activate additional neurocognitive mechanisms to those engaged in non-interactive situations. They further advance our understanding of which neurocognitive mechanisms underlie communicative interactions.

Keywords

Second-person neuroscience
Communication
Eye gaze
Facial displays
Cross-brain synchrony
fNIRS

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1

These authors contributed equally to this work.