Gender differences in subliminal affective face priming: A high?density ERP study

Introduction Subliminal affective priming effects (SAPEs) refer to the phenomenon by which presentation of an prime stimulus influences subsequent evaluation a target stimulus. Previous studies have reported that unconsciously processed stimuli affect behavioral performance more than consciously stimuli. However, impact SAPEs on face-specific N170 component is unclear. We studied how for fearful faces affected supraliminal using event-related potentials (ERPs). Methods Japanese adults (n = 44, 20 females) participated in this study. (neutral or fearful) were presented 17 ms, followed backward mask 283 ms and 800 (neutral, emotionally ambiguous, fearful). 128-channel ERPs recorded while participants judged expression as neutral fearful. Response rates response times also measured assessing alterations. Results Although results revealed no evidence SAPEs, we found gender-related right amplitude. Specifically, female exhibited enhanced amplitude primed faces, male decreased trials with faces. Male significant correlations between time prime-neutral condition. Conclusions Our ERP suggest existence gender difference target-face processing preceded subliminally face occipito-temporal region.