AUTHOR=Bortoloti Renato , de Almeida Rodrigo Vianna , de Almeida João Henrique , de Rose Julio C. TITLE=Emotional Faces in Symbolic Relations: A Happiness Superiority Effect Involving the Equivalence Paradigm JOURNAL=Frontiers in Psychology VOLUME=10 YEAR=2019 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00954 DOI=10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00954 ISSN=1664-1078 ABSTRACT=
The stimulus equivalence paradigm presented operational criteria to identify symbolic functions in observable behaviors. When humans match dissimilar stimuli (e.g., words to pictures), equivalence relations between those stimuli are likely to be demonstrated through behavioral tests derived from the logical properties of reflexivity, symmetry, and transitivity. If these properties are confirmed, one can say that those stimuli are members of an equivalence class in which each member is substitutable for the others. A number of studies, which have established equivalence classes comprised of arbitrary stimuli and pictures of faces expressing emotions, have found that valences of the faces affect the relatedness of equivalent stimuli. Importantly, several studies reported stronger relational strength in equivalence classes containing happy faces than in equivalence classes containing angry faces. The processes that may account for this higher degree of