Morality is in the eye of the beholder: the neurocognitive basis of the "anomalous-is-bad" stereotype

Abstract

Are people with flawed faces regarded as having flawed moral characters? An "anomalous-is-bad" stereotype is hypothesized to facilitate negative biases against people with facial anomalies (e.g., scars), but whether and how these biases affect behavior and brain functioning remain open questions. We examined responses to anomalous faces in the brain (using a visual oddball paradigm), behavior (in economic games), and attitudes. At the level of the brain, the amygdala demonstrated a specific neural response to anomalous faces-sensitive to disgust and a lack of beauty but independent of responses to salience or arousal. At the level of behavior, people with anomalous faces were subjected to less prosociality from participants highest in socioeconomic status. At the level of attitudes, we replicated previously reported negative character evaluations made about individuals with facial anomalies, and further identified explicit biases directed against them as a group. Across these levels of organization, the specific amygdala response to facial anomalies correlated with stronger just-world beliefs (i.e., people get what they deserve), less dispositional empathic concern, and less prosociality toward people with facial anomalies. Characterizing the "anomalous-is-bad" stereotype at multiple levels of organization can reveal underappreciated psychological burdens shouldered by people who look different.

Keywords: amygdala; disgust; empathy; faces; morality; neuroaesthetics.

Figure 1

Schematic of the oddball fMRI task design. Participants completed 540 trials of an oddball task (5 repetitions each of 90 learned faces (450 total), 1 instance each of 90 novel faces (30 anomalous, 30 beautiful, and 30 average‐looking)). Trials started with a photograph of a male or female face for 500 ms, followed by a null event for 1000 ms plus jitter lasting an average of 1833 ms (3333 ms per trial). F, female; M, male; N, novel.

Figure 2

A visual overview of the research design. This overview delineates between the two studies reported here; the levels of organization they investigated; the measures that were examined, including fMRI contrasts; and where the corresponding results—figures and tables, specifically—are located. The inset panel contains an overview of the fMRI masking procedure. Red boxes distinguish fMRI analyses used for exclusive masking, whereas green boxes signify inclusive masking.

Figure 3

Brain regions implicated by the oddball and functional localizer tasks. (A) Neural sensitivity to the salience of faces was characterized with the oddball task. Warm colors reflect increased activation for visually salient faces. Cool colors reflect decreased activation. (B) The neural response to arousing images of faces (beautiful and anomalous) was compared against responses to average‐looking faces low in arousal. This is shown together with the functional localizer for arousal. Warm colors reflect increased activation with increasing arousal. Cool colors reflect negative relations to arousal. (C) During the functional localizer, participants saw disgusting images of animals (e.g., leeches and cockroaches; top) and bodily injuries (bottom) along with scrambled versions of those images. Warm colors reflect stronger activation for disgusting versus scrambled images. Cool colors capture the reverse contrast. (D) A parametric modulation analysis characterized relations between hemodynamic response and attractiveness. Cool colors indicate negative relations.

Figure 4

Selective neural responses to anomalous faces and relations to implicit bias. (A) Regions where anomalous faces elicited greater activation than beautiful and average‐looking novel faces (top; no masking). Only disgusting animals and facial beauty conjointly implicated the left amygdala. Warm colors reflect increased activation for anomalous versus novel beautiful and average‐looking faces. Cool colors represent decreased activation. (B) Regions sensitive to both facial anomalies and implicit biases toward them (top; no masking). This analysis was repeated with inclusive masking for facial beauty and disgust toward animals and exclusive masking for visual salience and emotional arousal, with significant positive correlations restricted to the bilateral fusiform and left amygdala (bottom; selective masking). Warm colors reflect increased activation in response to anomalous (compared with novel beautiful and average‐looking) faces—in addition, however, these clusters were further positively correlated with implicit biases. Cool colors indicate negative correlations. IAT, Implicit Association Test.