Social Engineering Blogs

An Aggregator for Blogs About Social Engineering and Related Fields

Basic Emotions and Cultural Differences

Despite the universal nature of many expressions, it is pretty clear that cultural differences exist, but why?

It certainly would be simplistic to think that all emotional expressions are the exact same around the world, despite the existence of basic emotional expressions across cultures. In fact, a major 2015 study sought to trace the development of different expressions based on historical and cultural trends. This study found that historical migration patterns were powerful explanatory factors for cultural attitudes to emotional expressions.

We have previously written on the evolutionary basis of basic emotions as theorized by Charles Darwin, himself. Our fundamental way of interacting with the world helped to develop certain connections between expression and emotion, such as the narrowing of eyes when perceiving something disgusting.

This has led a team of scholars, including Humintell’s Dr. David Matsumoto, to track the historical migration patterns in different cultures as explanations for differing emotional expressions.

Essentially, they categorized numerous nations based on the extent to which the current population of each country descends from either a variety or a small number of “source countries.”

They found that diverse source populations, which they termed “historical heterogeneity,” accounted for variations in norms of emotional expressivity. For instance, historically diverse nations like Canada saw more varied expressions and an increased reliance on nonverbal behavior to convey individual differences.

On the other hand, more homogenous nations, like Pakistan or Austria, observed more predefined practices for guiding emotional expectations. Based on these norms, rules of etiquette and language use allowed for more predictable emotional expressions.

The study authors also sought to more specifically trace back the development of the use of smiles. While a smile of joy is one of the basic emotions, the particular expression of the smile is employed in diverse ways, such as to provide an emotional reward, maintain social bonds, or negotiate status.

After studying the use of smiles in homogenous nations, such as Japan, they concluded that smiling was rarely used to negotiate status given fixed hierarchies in those nations. Instead, it often pointed out transgressions or designated efforts to maintain existing statuses.

In contrast, heterogenous nations saw less predictable social hierarchies and structures, so smiles were often used to clarify positive intentions, such as the desire to share resources.

This all underscores what we told you last week about how better reading people can help facilitate cross-cultural communication. The study authors emphasized the importance of this research in promoting human interaction given the vast cross-cultural contact we experience in a globalized society.

While it can be overwhelming to try to keep both the universality of expressions and the different circumstances in which these emotions are applied straight, Humintell is here to help. Try checking out some past blogs for more information! Or even sign up for our cross-cultural training program!

Why Try to Read Others?

At Humintell, we certainly talk a lot about reading other people’s emotions, but why is this such a big deal?

One obvious answer is that it is just really fascinating psychology, but there are also relevant and practical reasons to improve your ability to read microexpressions and other nonverbal cues. Not only are they particularly useful during law enforcement interrogations or cross-cultural interactions, but the ability to read others is useful in almost any interpersonal setting.

But first, what exactly is a microexpression? As Humintell’s Director, Dr. David Matsumoto, explains, “Microexpressions are unconscious, extremely quick, sometimes full-face expressions of an emotion. And sometimes they’re partial and very subtle expressions of emotion.”

Often, these microexpressions signify one of the seven basic emotions, but the majority of people either does not see any expression change or cannot understand the brief facial tick they see. Part of this is due to the incredibly brief nature of microexpressions, which can pass over a face as quickly as one-fifteenth of a second.

This means, Dr. Matsumoto points out, that freeze frame shots of individuals exhibiting microexpressions are not particularly subtle, but instead “if you take a freeze frame on it on a video, you’ll see that a lot of times there’s a big facial expression that is very clear about what the person’s mental state is.”

Reading other people’s emotions is not limited to microexpressions, however, as gestures and other types of nonverbal behavior are also telling signs of subtle or hidden emotional states. Dr. Matsumoto divides gestures into “speech illustrators” and “emblems.” The former, speech illustrators, are everyday animated gestures that many people use to emphasize or complement their speech.

Speech illustrators tend to be used by people from every culture, but they do differ in specifics. Emblems, on the other hand, are culturally specific gestures that refer to specific phrases, like a thumbs up.

The ability to read microexpressions is incredibly helpful in law enforcement or national security-related settings, where an interviewee may actively be concealing information. Nonverbal behavior analysis can help us “understand other people’s true feelings, their thoughts, their motivations, their personalities or their intentions.”

Yet, as Dr. Matsumoto points out, the application of emotional detection is “very clear for anybody whose job it is to be able to get that kind of additional insight.” It is not limited to law enforcement professionals but can be helpful to psychotherapists, sales professionals, lawyers, doctors, etc.

Similarly, as the cultural dependency of different gestures alluded to, the ability to understand nonverbal behavior can help us understand exactly what a person is trying to say. Knowing specific gestures can help, but also given the universality of basic emotional expressions, happiness, anger, or fear all present themselves similarly across the world.

Stay tuned with Humintell for more information on the importance of reading other people’s emotions, but in the meantime, check out our training packages here and here.

The Contagious Smile

Many of us often feel that smiling can be irresistibly contagious, but is this actually true?

In fact, a recent study published in Trends in Cognitive Sciences adds to a growing body of evidence that indicates that other people’s expressions really can have a tangible impact on our mood. The study authors, Dr. Paula Niedenthal and Adrienne Wood, found that we instinctively mimic other people’s faces, triggering the associated expressions.

This serves as a way for people to learn to empathize and to better read others by literally trying on their facial expressions. Amazingly this process can happen in only a few hundred milliseconds.

As Dr. Niedenthal said, “You reflect on your emotional feelings and then you generate some sort of recognition judgment, and the most important thing that results is that you take the appropriate action–you approach the person or you avoid the person.”

While they did not report exactly how this works in our brain, their results are reminiscent of previous research on the use of mirror neurons. Mirror neurons are brain cells that are triggered, when we see other people’s actions. This can include facial expressions and many neurologists see mirror neurons as the key to explaining how we experience empathy.

However, the authors mentioned that this critical skill is not accessible to everyone, including those who have social disorders or challenges presenting facial expressions. Dr. Niedenthal pointed out that “There are some symptoms in autism where lack of facial mimicry may in part be due to suppression of eye contact.”

This is an exciting connection, given recent research that has shown that an autistic individual often struggles to empathize due to the inability to recognize faces and emotions. If an autistic individual has trouble even recognizing another person’s facial expression, it is that much more difficult to mimic it and thus empathize.

Similarly, Humintell has previously worked to draw attention to those who live with Moebius Syndrome. Those with this condition experience a form of facial paralysis that makes it impossible to display facial expressions. This causes challenges relating interpersonally as the lack of expression makes emotional communication challenging.

Presumably, from Dr. Niedenthal and Dr. Wood’s research, this also prevents effective facial mimicry for both the person with Moebius Syndrome and their interlocutor.

Thankfully, as we have discussed, reading facial expressions is not merely an innate ability on which we cannot improve. Instead, we can learn to better recognize people’s expressions and emotions.

That is exactly what Humintell is here for! If you want to better learn this skill, check out our workshops and training programs.