Two studies examined the hypothesis that geometric patterns in the facial expressions of anger and happiness provide information that permits observers to recognize the meaning of threat and warmth. A 1st study sought to isolate the configural properties by examining whether large-scale body movements encode affect-related meanings in similar ways. Results indicated that diagonal and angular body patterns convey threat, whereas round body patterns convey warmth. In a 2nd study, a set of 3 experiments using models of simple geometric patterns revealed that acute angles with downward pointing vertices conveyed the meaning of threat and that roundedness conveyed the meaning of warmth. Human facial features exhibit these same geometric properties in displays of anger and happiness.Mike Deaver, the self-styled "vicar of visuals," was the impresario of Reagan's visual choreography. In staging Reagan, Deaver spared no effort. At the 1984 Republican convention [the interior designer described his work for Deaver]. "Look, there are no square angles anywhere. Look at the chair: round top, curved legs. Look at the edge of the podium: no sharp corners. They're all rounded. Look at the lectern: curves everywhere. Rounded shapes are peaceful." Deaver wanted Reagan to come across as a soothing, reassuring presence. The podium backdrop conveyed a subliminal message of peaceableness. (Smith, 1988, pp. 414-415) Substantial bodies of research (e.g., Eibl-Eibesfeldt, 1989;Ekman, 1982;Izard, 1977) provide impressive support for Darwin's (1872) speculation that human beings express and recognize the primary emotions in uniform ways. Such systematic results, which are based on commonalities in the cross-cultural recognition of standard facial expressions of emotion, necessarily raise the question of the sources of these stable responses. Because these displays are formed by the movement of many individual facial features, it would seem that many individual stimuli need to be identified in order to recognize an emotional Portions of this article were presented at the 97th Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association, New Orleans, Louisiana, August 1989.We are grateful to Paul Sutherland, who graciously permitted us to observe his classes for several weeks and helped us understand how a dancer's body creates visual forms. We thank Dixie Durr, Virginia Brooks, and Susan Burck, who greatly facilitated our ability to undertake this study at an important early point in our work. We also thank Barbara Horgan, of the New \brk City Ballet, who made several critically needed tapes available to us. We are grateful to Hiram Fitzgerald, David Irwin, Norbert Kerr, and Rose Zacks, who read an earlier draft and made valuable suggestions regarding the study. Larry Messe, as always, finds new ways to provide generous assistance in the design, execution, and analysis of our work. We are also appreciative of the close attention provided by reviewers, whose questions and criticisms greatly helped us clarify our intentions.
Previous work has indicated that simple geometric shapes underlying facial expressions are capable of conveying emotional meaning. Specifically, a series of studies found that a simple shape, a downward-pointing "V," which is similar to the geometric configuration of the face in angry expressions, is perceived as threatening. A parallel line of research has determined that threatening stimuli more readily capture attention. In five experiments, the authors sought to determine whether this preferential processing was also present for the simple geometric form of a downward-pointing "V." Using a visual search paradigm, across these experiments the authors found that, when embedded in a field of other shapes, downward-pointing V's were detected faster and, in some cases, more accurately than identical shapes pointing upward. These findings indicate that the meaning of threat can be conveyed rapidly with minimal stimulus detail. In addition, in some cases, during trials of homogeneous fields of stimuli, fields of downward-pointing V's led to slower response times, suggesting that this shape's ability to capture attention may also extend to difficulty in disengaging attention as well.
Two studies examined the information that defines a threatening facial display. The first study identified those facial characteristics that distinguish between representations of threatening and nonthreatening facial displays. Masks that presented either threatening or nonthreatening facial displays were obtained from a number of non-Western cultures and scored for the presence of those facial features that discriminated between such displays in the drawings of two American samples. Threatening masks contained a significantly higher number of these characteristics across all cultures examined. The second study determined whether the information provided by the facial display might be more primary nonrepresentational visual patterns than facial features with obvious denotative meaning (e.g., diagonal lines rather than downturned eyebrows). The subjective response to sets of diagonal, angular, and curvilinear visual stimuli revealed that the nonrepresentational features of angularity and diagonality in the visual stimulus appeared to have the ability to evoke the subjective responses that convey the meaning of threat. A century-long debate was stimulated by Darwin's (1872) intriguing speculation that emotional expression in human beings, as in other animal species, might rest upon a common neuromuscular foundation. One line of reasoning (e.g., Birdwhistell, 1963; Klineberg, 1938; LaBarre, 1947), primarily based on anthropological evidence covering a wide array of human activity, has maintained that emotion is expressed through highly variable behaviors, cross-culturally, and so is best understood as the result of a culture-specific cognitive labeling process. Following more closely Darwin's interest in the stimulus configurations generated by facial displays, a second line of reasoning (Ekman, 1971,1982;Izard, 1971, 1977; among others) has provided impressive support for the position that speciescharacteristic features underlie facial displays of emotion. Typically, in this work, photographs of individuals experiencing (or actors simulating) a set of emotions are shown to members of different cultural groups who are then asked to identify the emotion displayed. These studies have shown that a wide range of emotional representations can be discriminated correctly (Ekman, 1971; Izard, 1971), with the results from less Western cultures parallel to those obtained from more Western cultures. More recently, such research has been attentive to the specific features that compose a type of facial display. Coding systems of emotionally related facial displays, such as Ekman and Friesen's (1978) Facial Action Coding System, are more than conve-We gratefully acknowledge the assistance of William Crano, Lester Hyman, Lawrence Messe, and Eileen Thompson in the design and execution of this study. Valuable comments by Thomas Carr, Hiram Fitzgerald, Lawrence Messe, and Rose Zacks on an earlier draft of this paper are much appreciated.
Darwin proposed and Ekman and Izard confirmed the presence of cross-cultural regularities in facial displays of emotion. Following their work, the author and his colleagues sought to find parallel mechanisms that would permit these displays to be decoded. A cross-cultural comparison of the display of anger and happiness in masks used in ritual social functions revealed that a set of geometric patterns, rather than actual facial features, conveyed these different emotional meanings. The power of nonrepresentational visual patterns to produce meaning was examined in a series of studies using materials that presented geometric shapes in a variety of line drawings, large-scale physical movement in classical ballet, and configurations among individuals in 17th-century Dutch art. Results across all studies suggested that for the emotions of anger and happiness, at least, meaning is carried in the geometric properties of the visual display.
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