EEG Signal Indicator for Emotional Reactivity

The main purpose of this study was to seek indicators that could effectively describe an individual’s subjective emotional reactivity with objective physiological signals. The study used VR to present two valences of stimuli to induce certain emotions, meanwhile collecting multimode physiological data. Then three dimensions of emotional reactivity, namely emotional intensity, emotional sensitivity and emotional persistence, measured by a self-assessment questionnaire, were correlated with individual’s EEG signals. Results showed that emotional persistence was significantly positively correlated with the change rate of both alpha bands under HVHA stimulus and beta bands under LVHA stimulus between two cerebral hemispheres. These findings are in accord with the frontal EEG lateralization theory that the left and right prefrontal cortex hemispheres process differently for multiple emotions. The change rate in alpha/beta ratio of the left hemisphere between the baseline and after HVHA stimulus was also found significantly positively correlated with emotional reactivity along with the sensitivity and intensity dimensions. This indicate that the relative power spectrum ratio of two frequency bands is more effective.