How do decision makers evaluate advice from advisors with happy and angry expressions? A behavioural and ERP study

In the process of decision-making based on conferring with advisors, people are sensitive to advisors’ emotional expressions. An advisor’s expression is considered a type of feedback. The quick detection of motivational or valence significance of feedback has been associated with feedback-related negativity (FRN). In this study, we investigated how decision makers evaluated advice that was distant from the original estimate provided by advisors with different emotional expressions based on behavioural, FRN, and P300 data. The results showed that participants were more likely to modify their initial estimates based on advice from advisors with happy expressions than from advisors with angry expressions, regardless of whether it was near-distance advice or far-distance advice. When facing far-distance advice, FRN amplitudes in angry-expression conditions were significantly larger than in happy-expression conditions. When facing near-distance advice, there was no significant difference in the FRN amplitude between happy- and angry-expression conditions. P300 amplitudes were larger in near-distance conditions than in far-distance conditions. These findings suggest that, as a type of feedback with social information, the advisor’s face will affect the decision maker’s evaluation of the advice, with a happy face of the advisor serving as correct feedback and an angry face serving as incorrect feedback.