Emotional Reactions to Facial Expressions in Social Anxiety: A Meta-Analysis of Self-Reports

Yogev Kivity, Jonathan D. Huppert

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

14 Scopus citations

Abstract

The current meta-analysis reviews 24 studies on self-reported emotional reactions to facial expressions (social rejection, social acceptance, and neutral) in socially anxious versus nonanxious individuals. We hypothesized that socially anxious individuals would perceive all face types as less approachable, more negative, and more arousing. After correcting for biases, results showed that socially anxious individuals, compared to controls, reported lower approachability to all types of expressions and higher arousal in response to neutral expressions. Variances among effects usually could not be explained by the proposed moderators. This suggests that current conceptualizations of social anxiety should take into account the willingness to approach social stimuli rather than global measures of emotion or arousal.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)367-375
Number of pages9
JournalEmotion Review
Volume8
Issue number4
DOIs
StatePublished - 1 Oct 2016
Externally publishedYes

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2015.

Keywords

  • approachability
  • arousal
  • emotion
  • facial expressions
  • social anxiety
  • valence

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