46 | New Scientist | 15 February 2020
the classic “gasping” fear face as threatening
and indicative of aggression – an unexpected
match that Crivelli has since found in some
other small-scale societies, such as the Mwani
of the Quirimbas archipelago in Mozambique.
Supporters of the orthodox view argue
that there is increasing agreement about
how emotions are displayed on faces across
a very diverse range of cultures. But Crivelli,
Barrett and others are convinced that there
is no such thing as universal emotional
expressions. If there were, why would we
teach young children that a smile indicates
happiness and a frown sadness, asks Crivelli,
whose daughter recently came home from
nursery school proudly showing off the
“surprise face” she had learned. In fact,
he believes that what we call “emotional
expressions” don’t relate to emotion at all.
Instead, he thinks they are tools we wield –
usually unconsciously – to get what we want
from others. And in 2018, Crivelli and Alan
Fridlund at the University of California,
Santa Barbara, laid out the evidence in
favour of the idea.
In this view, pioneered by Fridlund, the
supposed prototypical expressions of
emotions take on new meanings, which
aren’t necessarily universal. A smile is a
signal to work together, bond or be friends.
A pout is designed to garner care or protection
rather than to indicate sadness. Scowling, the
supposed expression of anger, may be used to
trigger another person to submit. A gasping
face signals submission, not fear (in the West
at least), and so could deflect an attack. Nose
scrunching, traditionally associated withdisgust, is reconceived as a rejection of the way
a social interaction is playing out.
We may find it hard to revise our ideas about
facial expressions. But not all cultures share
the entrenched dogma that people smile when
happy, scowl when angry and so on. When
Crivelli asks Trobriand Islanders if they think
it is possible to read the emotions of other
people in their faces, they usually answer “no”.
“They say we normally ‘have a face’, but it is to
seduce you, to force you to do things for me,”
he says. “They are engaged in dealing and
bargaining every day, and they will say that if
you want to get a good deal, smiling will help.”
Recast facial movements in this way, and
it changes how you perceive your social
interactions. This morning, when I furrowed
my brow at my young son, it wasn’t because
I was angry but to prompt him to submit to
my instruction to hurry up and get dressed. I
smiled at his head teacher because it would set
the tone for a cordial chat. And I beamed at a
toddler in a pushchair because I wanted to
convey that I wasn’t a threat. Both of these
smiles were genuine signals of support
and camaraderie, not polite or insincere
expressions of emotion.
Even if we concede that a smile does
more than display happiness, surely the
conventional view of smiling is supported by
the fact that people produce an “authentic”
smile that reaches the eyes – a so-called
Duchenne smile – whenever they feel
genuinely happy? Well, there is some
evidence that this isn’t a fact at all.
Crivelli and his colleagues found that
whether victorious judo fighters produced
a Duchenne smile depended more on their
interaction with the audience than on the joy
they presumably felt on winning a medal.
Another study found that tenpin bowlers
tended not to smile when they scored a strike,
but only when they turned to look at fellow
bowlers. Contrary to popular perception,
there is even evidence that Duchenne smiles
can be faked (see “Poker face?”, left).SVYATOSLAV LYPYNSKYY/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO“ Not all cultures
share the dogma
that people smile
when happy,
scowl when
angry and so on”
US psychologist Paul Ekman
has argued for the existence of
“micro-expressions” that occur
when we are fighting to hide our
emotions. For instance, someone
who is acting calm but actually
feeling nervous will betray their
anxiety in fleeting but noticeable
muscular movements. This
“involuntary emotional leakage”
exposes a person’s true emotions,
Ekman maintains. His idea is
contested. Nevertheless, if you are
with people who believe that our
faces reveal our true emotions —
and most people do — you could
use this to your advantage.
To persuade others that you
are genuinely happy, for example,
try faking a Duchenne smile, in
which the orbicularis oculi muscles
around the eyes get involved, as
well as the zygomaticus major
muscles, which raise the corners
of the mouth. Contrary to popular
belief, a substantial minority of
people can consciously do this.
In fact, people tend to associate
wrinkled up eyes with more
intense and sincere emotion,
not just for happiness but for
pain and sadness, too.
What if you want to work out
how someone else is feeling?
There may be other clues in their
face. A team led by Aleix Martinez
at Ohio State University has found
unique patterns of facial colouring
linked to various emotions, a
result, the group believes, of subtle
changes in blood flow affecting
skin tone and complexion.
Happiness is associated with
redness on the cheeks and chin,
for example, while disgust is
associated with a blue-yellow
tinge around the lips and a
red-green colour around the
nose and forehead. People asked
to match faces displaying such
patterns to emotional states got
it right about 75 per cent of the
time. So if you want to judge
how other people are feeling,
you might do better to ignore
their facial contortions and look
for these colour clues instead.Poker face?
A smile is far from the only way
to express happiness