WildLab: A naturalistic free viewing experiment reveals previously unknown electroencephalography signatures of face processing

TY - JOUR

T1 - WildLab: A naturalistic free viewing experiment reveals previously unknown electroencephalography signatures of face processing

AU - Gert, Anna L

AU - Ehinger, Benedikt V

AU - Timm, Silja

AU - Kietzmann, Tim C

AU - König, Peter

N1 - © 2022 The Authors. European Journal of Neuroscience published by Federation of European Neuroscience Societies and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

PY - 2022/12

Y1 - 2022/12

N2 - Neural mechanisms of face perception are predominantly studied in well-controlled experimental settings that involve random stimulus sequences and fixed eye positions. Although powerful, the employed paradigms are far from what constitutes natural vision. Here, we demonstrate the feasibility of ecologically more valid experimental paradigms using natural viewing behaviour, by combining a free viewing paradigm on natural scenes, free of photographer bias, with advanced data processing techniques that correct for overlap effects and co-varying non-linear dependencies of multiple eye movement parameters. We validate this approach by replicating classic N170 effects in neural responses, triggered by fixation onsets (fixation event-related potentials [fERPs]). Importantly, besides finding a strong correlation between both experiments, our more natural stimulus paradigm yielded smaller variability between subjects than the classic setup. Moving beyond classic temporal and spatial effect locations, our experiment furthermore revealed previously unknown signatures of face processing: This includes category-specific modulation of the event-related potential (ERP)'s amplitude even before fixation onset, as well as adaptation effects across subsequent fixations depending on their history.

AB - Neural mechanisms of face perception are predominantly studied in well-controlled experimental settings that involve random stimulus sequences and fixed eye positions. Although powerful, the employed paradigms are far from what constitutes natural vision. Here, we demonstrate the feasibility of ecologically more valid experimental paradigms using natural viewing behaviour, by combining a free viewing paradigm on natural scenes, free of photographer bias, with advanced data processing techniques that correct for overlap effects and co-varying non-linear dependencies of multiple eye movement parameters. We validate this approach by replicating classic N170 effects in neural responses, triggered by fixation onsets (fixation event-related potentials [fERPs]). Importantly, besides finding a strong correlation between both experiments, our more natural stimulus paradigm yielded smaller variability between subjects than the classic setup. Moving beyond classic temporal and spatial effect locations, our experiment furthermore revealed previously unknown signatures of face processing: This includes category-specific modulation of the event-related potential (ERP)'s amplitude even before fixation onset, as well as adaptation effects across subsequent fixations depending on their history.

KW - Humans

KW - Facial Recognition/physiology

KW - Electroencephalography/methods

KW - Evoked Potentials/physiology

KW - Eye Movements

KW - Adaptation, Physiological

KW - Photic Stimulation

U2 - 10.1111/ejn.15824

DO - 10.1111/ejn.15824

M3 - SCORING: Journal article

C2 - 36113866

VL - 56

SP - 6022

EP - 6038

JO - EUR J NEUROSCI

JF - EUR J NEUROSCI

SN - 0953-816X

IS - 11

ER -