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Influence of deafness and sign language on discrimination of emotional facial expressions in the central and peripheral visual fields

Becq, Maxime
(2019)

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Becq_06621400_2019.pdf
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Becq_06621400_2019_Errata.pdf
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Details

Supervisors
Collignon, Olivier ; Falagiarda, Federica
Faculty
Faculté de psychologie, logopédie, sexologie et des sciences de la famille
Degree label
Master [120] en sciences psychologiques
Abstract
Without auditory inputs, early deaf people experience neural rearrangements. In fact, the effects of deafness on cognitive functioning have been investigated many times before. One of the research topics was the influence of auditory deprivation on discrimination of facial expressions. According to the studies, early deaf adults (ED) demonstrate higher performances in this discrimination. However, auditory deprivation should not be considered alone. Sign language, which is the prior mean of communication of most of ED, may also hold an important role in discrimination of facial expressions. The present study investigates the potential influence of deafness and sign language on discrimination of emotional facial expressions. Because Eds’ visual attention is supposed to be higher in the periphery, we also take into consideration the central and peripheral visual fields. In a preliminary version of the experiment, seven early ED, four hearing signers (HS) and eleven hearing non-signers (HC) were submitted to a task in which they were asked to identify the emotion (disgust, fear and happiness) portrayed by actors. Stimuli were presented in the center, the superior visual field and the inferior visual field. Because a sufficient level of statistical power has not been reached, we could not prove any positive influence of deafness or sign language on discrimination of emotional facial expressions. Therefore, this study should need further testing in order to demonstrate whether deafness and/or sign language may lead to greater performances in the discrimination of facial expressions across visual fields. Nevertheless, effects of position, emotion and duration are outlined and discussed. The heterogeneity existing in the populations of interest is considered as well.