Measuring and modeling facial affect

In recent years, researchers in computer science and human-computer interac tion have become increasingly interested in characterizing perception of fa cial affect. Ironically, this applied interest comes at a time when the cla ssic findings on perception of human facial affect are being challenged in the psychological research literature, largely on methodological grounds. T his paper first describes two experiments that empirically address Russell' s methodological criticisms of the classic work on measuring "basic emotion s," as well as his alternative approach toward modeling "facial affect spac e." Finally, a user study on affect in a prototype model of a robot face is reported; these results are compared with the human findings from Experime nt 1. This work provides new data on measuring facial affect, while also de monstrating how basic and more applied research can mutually inform one ano ther.