Learning value from others’ emotions: affective observation guides decision-making under uncertainty

Journal article

Humans often rely on others’ emotional reactions to navigate uncertain environments where learning the value of ambiguous stimuli is crucial. Across four pre-registered Experiments (N = 456), we investigated whether affective observation - merely observing others’ facial emotional reactions outside direct interaction or communication - guides evaluation and selection of unfamiliar objects. Participants first observed individuals reacting happily, neutrally, or angrily to unfamiliar objects, before using a virtual basket to collect objects for points. After the task, they rated the perceived value of those objects. Participants consistently tended to collect objects previously associated with positive reactions, rating them as more valuable than objects associated with neutral or angry reactions, even after minimal observations. This tendency increased with greater emotional contrast (e.g., more choices for objects paired with positive over negative reactions compared to neutral over negative ones), being strongest when observed reactions were consistent, but weakened when reactions conflicted. Furthermore, participants generalized observed emotional evaluations to new objects sharing perceptual features (i.e., color or shape), choosing to collect objects that resembled those associated with positive reactions. Kinematic measures revealed faster and more direct movements toward positively associated objects, indicating that observed reactions impact implicit motor responses based on anticipated value. Together, these findings demonstrate that affective observation supports adaptive behaviour by translating others’ emotions into perceived value signals, shaping decisions in novel contexts. The results highlight facial emotion as a low-cost, efficient channel for social value learning, extending models of observational and affective learning to ecological decision-making.

Authors: Ganzetti, T; McEllin, L; Clement, F; Parkinson, B; Shore, D

• Publication status: Accepted
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: American Psychological Association
• Journal: Journal of Experimental Psychology: General More from this journal
• Acceptance date: 2026-10-17
• EISSN: 1939-2222
• ISSN: 0096-3445
• Language: English
• Keywords: observational learning; communication; decision-making; social learning; emotion perception