Unattractive Face Amplifies Late Frontal Slow Wave during Visual Perspective Taking

Abstract

The ability to imagine what a visual scenery looks like from other viewer's perspective is termed "second order visual perspective taking" and is considered to be linked with such functions as empathy and mentalizing. A few recent studies indicated the possibility that empathic response towards others is modulated by their physical attractiveness. On the basis of this, it was conjectured that visual perspective taking is also under the influences of viewer's attractiveness. The present study investigated this hypothesis by examining the effects of viewer's facial attractiveness on neural activation during visual perspective taking. The main focus of interest was the effect of facial attractiveness on late frontal slow wave (LFSW), an event-related potential component that has hitherto been shown to reflect the process of other's mental state representation. The results revealed larger LFSW when taking visual perspective of unattractive than attractive viewers. Together with some of the existing literature, the present finding indicates that people have stronger motivation to see things from unattractive other's perspective than attractive one.