Human communication of emotion via sweat : How specific is it? (abstract)

Females evaluate ambiguous facial expression – morphed between happy and fearful – faces as more fearful when exposed to fear sweat as compared to control odor (Zhou & Chen, 2009). We investigated the specificity of this effect, i.e. whether processing of fearful faces is affected specifically by fear sweat. In Study 1, we investigated the influence of the sensory properties of sweat in general, such that females may have a general tendency to disambiguate towards fearfulness in the context of any sweat odor. Thirty females evaluated ambiguous faces as either happy or fearful when exposed to fearful sweat, sports sweat or control pad. Using intensity evaluations of the sweat as covariates in the analysis, initially significant differences between fearful sweat and sport sweat in the facial evaluation task (p = .029) remained significant (p = .031). In Study 2 we investigated whether facial expressions are evaluated as fearful also in the context of sweat associated with another negatively valenced emotion: disgust. Twenty-four females performed the same task when exposed to fear sweat, disgust sweat or control pad. Significant differences emerged at one of the central morph levels, with the difference between fear and control significant at p = .014, between fear and disgust at p = .033, but ns between disgust and control pad. However, only the difference between fear and control remained after covariance-analysis leaving the difference between fear and disgust sweat insignificant. Conclusion: Evidence so far supports the notion of specific effects for emotional sweat versus nonemotional sweat, but not that of specificity between two negatively valenced emotional states