DECISIONS AND EMOTIONSARE EMOTIONS UNIVERSAL?
Another question that engages researchers is whether or not emotional
facial expressions are the same the world over. The seminal work
in this area was conducted by Paul Ekman (now a consultant on the
popular US series Lie to Me). He travelled the world, from Japan to
the jungles of Papua New Guinea, carrying a set of photos of people
pulling various emotional facial expressions, and he found that humans
everywhere were able to interpret the emotions accurately. Other more
recent research has shown that it’s not just the facial expression of core
emotions – happiness, sadness, fear and disgust – that are the same
worldwide. Jessica Tracy at the University of British Columbia and David
Matsumoto at San Francisco State University analysed photos taken of
judo competitors at the 2004 Olympics and Paralympics, and found that
all of them, wherever their country of origin and regardless of whether
they were sighted or born blind, displayed shame and pride in the
characterize the different forms of crying. Judith Nelson, a psycho-
therapist, has distinguished between at least three kinds: loud, protest
crying; subdued, sad crying; and detached, tearless crying, of the sort
provoked by hopelessness. Of course anyone who’s been to a wedding
will know that people also often cry when they’re happy! The research
on this kind of crying is even thinner on the ground.