The interaction of emotional information from the voice and touch

[摘要] We communicate emotions through nonverbal channels, for example vocal expression. Previous studies have examined the perception of emotions from voice and reported that six basic emotions and some positive emotions can be recognized above chance level [e.g., 1, 2]. Several studies have focused on the perception from multisensory information including voice, most focusing on voice and face [3–7]. Takagi et al. (2015) examined the multisensory interaction in emotional communication, specifically the facilitation effect. The facilitation effect is defined as the difference in the accuracies between multisensory congruent condition (e.g., happy face and happy voice) and unimodal condition (e.g., happy voice). Therefore, the facilitation effect represents whether the unimodal perception of emotions is facilitated by adding emotional information expressed with the other channel. Takagi et al. revealed that the perception of vocal emotions was facilitated by emotionally congruent face. However, it is not clear whether touch facilitates the perception of vocal emotions. Interpersonal touch plays an important role in our daily communication, for instance that between infants and caregiver [8]. Moreover, recent research revealed that positive emotions can be communicated more correctly through touch than through voice [9]. Given that, it is possible that touch facilitates the perception of positive emotions through voice. Therefore, we examine whether touch facilitates the perception of vocal emotion. Specifically, we hypothesize that emotionally congruent touch facilitates the perception of vocal emotions (i.e., facilitation effect), especially for positive emotions.

[学科分类] 声学和超声波

[关键词] Emotion;Audio-tactile interaction;Multisensory