Positive-negative asymmetry in the identification of faces on the basis of descriptions of happy and sad facial expressions

Research on the positive-negative asymmetry hypothesis is reported. Subjects were asked to match photographs of faces with descriptions of the faces' emotional expressions (Study 1). The results did not confirm the expected negativity effect according to which negative expressions would be more accurately matched than positive ones. The explanation that the negativity effect would be masked by an extremity effect was ruled out (Study 2). However, consistent with positive-negative asymmetry theory, faces with negative expressions were more accurately identified on the basis of descriptions made when the expressions were positive, than faces with positive expressions were on the basis of descriptions made when the expressions were negative (Study 3).