Can you read my emotion?

In the last post, I talked about symbolic language, which is the language created by humans based on a series of symbols that convey meaning. What can we communicate without using this artificial system? Emotions.

Have you ever fed a child a food they didn't like? What expression did they make? Even if the child couldn't say, "I dislike it," you understood that they didn't enjoy the food. The face is capable of communicating an emotion, and we are capable of understanding it. We don't need to study how to read emotions from the face; we know how to do it. But why?

According to Darwin, emotions have an evolutionary origin. Do you know the shape of your ears? It has evolved over time to collect sound waves more effectively. The same goes for emotions. Animals have developed specific behaviors depending on the emotion they experience. But is it true that we can recognize emotions from facial expressions?

Paul Ekman addressed this issue by investigating whether very different populations were capable of recognizing emotions. Ekman defined six basic emotions (joy, sadness, anger, fear, disgust, surprise) and examined the percentage of emotion recognition from the face in different populations. The results of his studies are summarized in his Neuro-Cultural Theory.

Reading emotions from the face, however, is not always so easy. A child doesn't need to hide that they find the offered food disgusting, but if it's your partner who has prepared a romantic dinner for you and, unfortunately, you didn't like the first course, maybe you don't feel like revealing your disgust. So, you smile and say that you like it. Can emotions be masked?

According to Ekman, facial expressions displayed within half a second (called microexpressions) are uncontrollable and reveal genuine emotions. After half a second, cultural mediators come into play, allowing us to display an emotion in line with the other person's expectations. It is the desired emotion by the person who prepared the dinner and wants approval.

It is important to note that Ekman's work has been subject to methodological criticisms, and there is currently no empirical evidence that supports the uniformity and universality of emotions. Ekman's theory needs to be integrated by considering the context. It is not only through the face that we recognize emotions; the body and the context in which emotions are expressed also contribute to their recognition.

Sources:

• Darwin, C. (1872). The expression of the emotions in man and animals. 
• Ekman, P., & Friesen, W. V. (1971). Constants across cultures in the face and emotion. 
• Ekman, P. (1973). Cross-cultural studies of facial expression. 
• Carrol, J. M., & Russel, J. A. (1996). Do facial expressions signal specific emotions? Judging emotion from the face in context.

Can you read emotions just by observing others? Can you hide your emotions when required?

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