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Research Interests

Reginald Adams is interested in how we extract social and emotional meaning from nonverbal cues, particularly via the face. His work addresses how multiple social messages (e.g., emotion, gender, race, age, etc.) combine and interact to form unified representations that guide our impressions of and responses to others. Of particular interest is the functional correspondence between static and expressive cues; at a fundamental level both signal basic intentions to approach-avoid, dominate, and/or affiliate. With this in mind, his current work examines the influences of eye gaze, social group memberships (e.g., gender and race), and facial appearance on the way we process and perceive others’ mental and emotional states. Although his questions are social psychological in origin, his research draws upon visual cognition and affective neuroscience to address social perception at the functional and neuroanatomical levels.

Recent Publications

Adams, R.B., Jr., Rule, N, Franklin, R.G., Jr., Wang, E., Stevenson, M.T., Yoshikawa, S., Nomura, M., Sato, W., Kveraga, K., & Ambady, N. (in press). Cross-cultural reading the mind in the eyes. An fMRI investigation. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience.

Adams, R.B., Jr., Franklin, R.G., Rule, N.O., Freeman, J.B., Yoshikawa, S., Hadjikhani, N., Kveraga, K. & Ambady, N. (in press). Culture, gaze, and the neural processing of fear expressions: An fMRI investigation. Social, Cognitive, & Affective Neuroscience.

Franklin, R.G., Jr. & Adams, R.B., Jr. (in press). The two sides of beauty: Laterality and the duality of facial attractiveness. Brain & Cognition.

Adams, R.B., Jr., Franklin, R.G., Jr., Nelson, A.J., & Stevenson, M.T. (in press). Compound social cues in human face processing. To appear in: R.B. Adams, Jr., N. Ambady, K. Nakayama, & S. Shimojo (Eds.), The Science of Social Vision, Oxford University Press.

Adams R.B., Jr., & Franklin, R.G., Jr. (2009). Influence of Emotional Expression on the Processing of Gaze Direction. Motivation & Emotion, 33, 106-112.

Franklin, R. G., Jr. & Adams, R.B., Jr.(2009). A dual-process account of facial attractiveness: Sexual and nonsexual routes. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 45, 1156-1159.

Rule, N.O., Ambady, N., Adams, R.B., Jr., & Macrae, C.N. (2008). Facets of the face: Accuracy and awareness in the perception of male sexual orientation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 95, 1019-1028.

Adams, R.B., Jr., Ambady, N., Macrae, C. N., & Kleck, R. E. (2006). Emotional expressions forecast approach-avoidance behavior. Motivation & Emotion, 30, 177-186.

Marsh, A. A., Adams, R.B., Jr., & Kleck, R.E. (2005).  Why do fear and anger look the way they do?  Form and social function in facial expressions. Personality and Social Psychological Bulletin, 31, 73-86.

Adams, R.B., Jr., Gordon, H.L., Baird, A.A., Ambady, N., & Kleck, R.E.  (2003). Effects of gaze on amygdala sensitivity to anger and fear faces. Science, 300, 1536.

Adams, R.B., Jr., & Kleck, R.E. (2003). Perceived gaze direction and the processing of facial displays of emotion. Psychological Science, 14, 644-647.