On The Power of Subtle Expressive Cues in the Perception of Human Affects

TL;DR

The paper addresses how subtle expressive cues, especially gaze direction inferred from nose orientation, influence affect perception in simple sketch illustrations of humans. It introduces a sketch-based methodology that combines expert illustrator input with lightweight user studies to evaluate cues beyond facial expressions. Findings show that minor gaze-related cues can shift perceived affect and context, demonstrating effects such as fear, curiosity, and happiness depending on pose. The work suggests that context-aware systems should account for these nuanced cues and proposes a practical, artist-driven approach to study affect in a scalable way.

Abstract

In this study, we introduce a sketch-based method for testing how subtle expressive cues influence the perception of affect in illustrations of human figures. We specifically study the impact of human posture and gaze direction, implicitly specified through nose orientation, on perceived emotions and mood. Through a series of user studies using sketchy illustrations of a running figure, where a professional illustrator manipulated gaze direction through adjustments on the nose orientation, we found that this simple change resulted in a diverse range of perceived affects, spanning from fear to concern and wonder. These findings shed light on the importance of fine details in defining context for context-aware system designs and underscore the importance of recognizing and expressing affect. Understanding minor expressive cues is crucial to developing emotionally intelligent systems capable of expressing affect.

Figures (12)

• Figure 1: Expressions such as anger, happiness, sadness, pride, and fear only with posture without any facial expression.
• Figure 2: Droplets help to change and exaggerate perceived expressions akleman2020.
• Figure 3: This example shows that props such as droplets can be used to significantly increase the intensity of perceived expressions. Droplets near the eyes create a sad expression, droplets on the forehead give the impression of fatigue, and droplets under the nose give the impression of sickness even in a neutral face. For more examples see akleman2020.
• Figure 4: An artist created sets of sketchy illustrations to test the validity of our hypothesis. These are some examples of four sets that provide simplified visual depictions of running people.
• Figure 5: The illustration set with eye-gaze direction variable.