Single-trial ERP evidence for the three-stage scheme of facial expression processing

Using a rapid serial visual presentation paradigm, we previously showed that the average amplitudes of six event-related potential (ERP) components were affected by different categories of emotional faces. In the current study, we investigated the six discriminating components on a single-trial level to clarify whether the amplitude difference between experimental conditions results from a difference in the real variability of single-trial amplitudes or from latency jitter across trials. It is found that there were consistent amplitude differences in the single-trial P1, N170, VPP, N3, and P3 components, demonstrating that a substantial proportion of the average amplitude differences can be explained by the pure variability in amplitudes on a single-trial basis between experimental conditions. These single-trial results verified the three-stage scheme of facial expression processing beyond multitrial ERP averaging, and showed the three processing stages of fear popup, emotional/unemotional discrimination, and complete separation based on the single-trial ERP dynamics.