The Impact of Threatening Facial Expressions on Negotiation: An Eye‐Tracking Study

Abstract

ABSTRACT Introduction Facial expressions play a crucial role in social interactions, influencing trust, and decision‐making. In negotiations, threatening expressions may convey dominance or hostility, potentially reducing cooperation. This study explores how threatening facial expressions and autistic traits (ATs) affect social decision‐making in the Ultimatum Game (UG), focusing on their main effects on UG offers. Method Fifty adults participated in the study. A Linear Mixed Model (LMM) was conducted to analyze the main effects of threat level and ATs on UG proposals. In addition, eye‐tracking technology was used to investigate participants' visual attention toward different facial areas. Results The results revealed a significant main effect of threatening facial expressions, as participants made lower offers in response to high‐threat faces. However, ATs did not show a significant main effect on UG proposals. Eye‐tracking data showed that participants focused more on the eyes of high‐threat faces compared to low‐threat faces. Conclusion These findings support the Emotion‐as‐Social‐Information (EASI) model, suggesting that emotional expressions, particularly threatening ones, influence negotiation behavior. The study enhances understanding of how facial cues and individual differences in ATs affect cooperation and decision‐making in social interactions.

Keywords

• autistic traits
• eye‐tracking
• facial expressions
• social decision‐making
• threat
• Ultimatum Game