Toward a dialect theory: Cultural differences in the expression and recognition of posed facial expressions.

Elfenbein, Hillary Anger; Beaupré, Martin G.; Lévesque, Manon; Heß, Ursula

doi:10.1037/1528-3542.7.1.131

Cited by 295 publications

(313 citation statements)

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“…For example, East Asian models of fear, disgust, and anger show characteristic early signs of emotional intensity with the eyes, which are under less voluntary control than the mouth (26), reflecting restrained facial behaviors as predicted by the literature (27). Similarly, culture-specific dialects (28) or accents (29) would diversify basic facial expression signals across cultures, giving rise to cultural hallmarks of facial behavior. For example, consider the "happy" models in Fig.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Facial expressions of emotion are not culturally universal

Jack

Garrod

et al. 2012

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

671

484

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Since Darwin's seminal works, the universality of facial expressions of emotion has remained one of the longest standing debates in the biological and social sciences. Briefly stated, the universality hypothesis claims that all humans communicate six basic internal emotional states (happy, surprise, fear, disgust, anger, and sad) using the same facial movements by virtue of their biological and evolutionary origins [Susskind JM, et al. (2008) Nat Neurosci 11:843-850]. Here, we refute this assumed universality. Using a unique computer graphics platform that combines generative grammars [Chomsky N (1965) MIT Press, Cambridge, MA] with visual perception, we accessed the mind's eye of 30 Western and Eastern culture individuals and reconstructed their mental representations of the six basic facial expressions of emotion. Crosscultural comparisons of the mental representations challenge universality on two separate counts. First, whereas Westerners represent each of the six basic emotions with a distinct set of facial movements common to the group, Easterners do not. Second, Easterners represent emotional intensity with distinctive dynamic eye activity. By refuting the long-standing universality hypothesis, our data highlight the powerful influence of culture on shaping basic behaviors once considered biologically hardwired. Consequently, our data open a unique nature-nurture debate across broad fields from evolutionary psychology and social neuroscience to social networking via digital avatars.modeling | reverse correlation | categorical perception | top-down processing | cultural specificity

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Facial expressions of emotion are not culturally universal

Jack

Garrod

et al. 2012

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

671

484

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The observation of-not always insubstantialdifferences in emotion recognition rates between cultures led more recently to the notion of cultural dialects (Elfenbein & Ambady 2003;Elfenbein et al 2007). Specifically, it has been argued that there is a universal language of emotion but with local dialects that differ subtly from each other.…”

Section: What Do Facial Expressions Express?mentioning

confidence: 99%

The face is not an empty canvas: how facial expressions interact with facial appearance

Heß

Adams

Kleck

2009

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

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Faces are not simply blank canvases upon which facial expressions write their emotional messages. In fact, facial appearance and facial movement are both important social signalling systems in their own right. We here provide multiple lines of evidence for the notion that the social signals derived from facial appearance on the one hand and facial movement on the other interact in a complex manner, sometimes reinforcing and sometimes contradicting one another. Faces provide information on who a person is. Sex, age, ethnicity, personality and other characteristics that can define a person and the social group the person belongs to can all be derived from the face alone. The present article argues that faces interact with the perception of emotion expressions because this information informs a decoder's expectations regarding an expresser's probable emotional reactions. Facial appearance also interacts more directly with the interpretation of facial movement because some of the features that are used to derive personality or sex information are also features that closely resemble certain emotional expressions, thereby enhancing or diluting the perceived strength of particular expressions.Keywords: emotion; facial expression; facial appearance Facial expressions of emotion have long been of interest to philosophers and psychologists. Darwin's (1872Darwin's ( / 1965 seminal work On the Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals was a first attempt to systematically understand emotion expression and its meaning. In this book, he proposed a number of explanations as to why certain facial and bodily behaviours communicate certain emotions. In doing so, Darwin had no doubt that the expressive behaviour that he described was part of an underlying emotional state, that is, that emotion expressions have communicative value specifically because they are outward manifestations of an inner state. Darwin assumed clear parallels and antecedents to human emotions in the emotions of animals and our humanoid ancestors, and consequently considered emotion expressions to be universal across human cultures.

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“…Ekman and others pointed out that⎯apart of those prototypic expressions described in EmFACS (Emotional Facial Action Coding System)⎯other variations of mimic expressions for the basic emotions are common (Ekman, 2003). Elfenbein, Beaupré, Lévesque, and Hess (2007) introduced the dialect theory in which differences in natural mimic for diverse cultural groups are discussed. So, in a standardized picture set, a compromise between naturalness and standardization should be aspired.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%