Unpacking the Face

"We are such creatures of language that what we hear
takes precedence over what is supposed to be our primary
channel of communication, the visual channel"

The Naked Face, published in New Yorker, August 2002, by Malcolm Gladwell is a tantalising article on reading other people's facial expression.

Gladwell writes about Paul Ekman, a San-Francisco psychologist, who first discovered that facial 'expressions were the universal products of evolution' - not culture as it had been previously assumed.

Not only do our emotions create facial expression but what Ekman and a colleague discovered was that 'expression alone is sufficient to create marked changes in the autonomic nervous system' - so it's true what they say, smiling can make you feel better! They discovered this accidentally. Whilst trying the facial expression of anguish/distress they found that they both felt terrible. 'Emotion doesn't just go from the inside out. It goes from the outside in.'

Wonderfully written and dealing with interesting concepts, this article is well worth the long read. It can be found here along with other Malcolm Bradwell articles: http://www.gladwell.com/2002/2002_08_05_a_face.htm

Here is a taster from the beginning of section 2:

'All of us, a thousand times a day, read faces. When someone says "I love you," we look into that person's eyes to judge his or her sincerity. When we meet someone new, we often pick up on subtle signals, so that, even though he or she may have talked in a normal and friendly manner, afterward we say, "I don't think he liked me," or "I don't think she's very happy." We easily parse complex distinctions in facial expression. If you saw me grinning, for example, with my eyes twinkling, you'd say I was amused. But that's not the only way we interpret a smile. If you saw me nod and smile exaggeratedly, with the corners of my lips tightened, you would take it that I had been teased and was responding sarcastically. If I made eye contact with someone, gave a small smile and then looked down and averted my gaze, you would think I was flirting. If I followed a remark with an abrupt smile and then nodded, or tilted my head sideways, you might conclude that I had just said something a little harsh, and wanted to take the edge off it. You wouldn't need to hear anything I was saying in order to reach these conclusions. The face is such an extraordinarily efficient instrument of communication that there must be rules that govern the way we interpret facial expressions. But what are those rules? And are they the same for everyone?'

Perhaps what interests me so much in this article is that I've always thought I was really observant and a very good people/face reader. Wish I could take the test Ekman devised!