We review recent work demonstrating consistent context effects during emotion
perception. Visual scenes, voices, bodies, other faces, cultural orientation,
and even words shape how emotion is perceived in a face, calling into question
the still-common assumption that the emotional state of a person is written on
and can be read from the face like words on a page. Incorporating context during
emotion perception appears to be routine, efficient, and, to some degree,
automatic. This evidence challenges the standard view of emotion perception
represented in psychology texts, in the cognitive neuroscience literature, and
in the popular media and points to a necessary change in the basic paradigm used
in the scientific study of emotion perception.
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