Non-verbal signs of personality: Communicative meanings of facial expressions

Abstract

Abstact. There is a lot of evidence that most people are capable of recognizing emotions by facial expressions. What information does a facial expression usually provide? Can emotions be shown without facial expressions? Can there be facial expressions without a corresponding emotional state? Are there individual facial expressions? The studies of various aspects of non-verbal communication show both similarities and differences in non-verbal behavior. It is argued that similarities are most evident at the individual level, when the focus is on the objective, formal features of behavior, while differences are more likely to be found when the analysis focuses on the relationship between individuals and interpersonal meanings of behavior. Despite the rapid expansion of research on non-verbal communication, most of it describes simple differences in the display of non-verbal signals. Although they differ in almost every other respect, most facial measurement methods focus on what is seen, on what the researcher can identify when seeing some facial movements. Most of the research methods applied are not sufficient for the study of this complex, multidimensional issue. Like all basic studies of communicative processes, proxemics is more about how than why, and more about structure than content. The article focuses on the question whether non-verbal behavior reflects cultural similarities or differences, and whether different levels of analysis allow to observe both cultural homogeneity and diversity inherent in most acts of non-verbal behavior. The authors consider the data of laboratory experiments on the relationship between emotions and adults’ facial expressions: some studies confirm the high consistency between fun and smiling, and from the low to moderate consistency between other positive emotions and smiling. The available evidence on surprise and disgust suggests that these emotions are accompanied by their ‘traditional’ facial expressions or even some components of such expressions only in a minority of cases. The American anthropologist, one of the founders of kinesics, Birdwhistell introduced this term for the complex study of facial expressions, poses, gait, and visible movements of arms and body. Birdwhistell argues that body language is determined by cultural environment rather than universal genetic programs. Birdwhistell defines kinesics as “the study of body-motion as related to the nonverbal aspects of interpersonal communication”. He argues that communication with body motion is systemic, socially learned and communicative unless proven otherwise. The article considers in detail the works and theories of Birdwhistell who often had to admit that some of his ideas were controversial. The authors conclude that Birdwhistell’s works have serious mistakes, and other researchers failed to develop his theory of kinesics. Thus, the authors consider the research in this field focusing on the so-called recognition of the communicative meanings of facial expressions.

Keywords

• emotions
• facial expressions
• emotional state
• non-verbal communication
• nonverbal behavior
• facial measurement methods
• proxemics
• cultural similarities and differences
• kinesics