Frown

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In his 16th-century portrait of an unidentified man, Albrecht Durer powerfully captures personality through facial expression, body language, and clothing. Work: Bildnis eines unbekannten Mannes (1521) Albrecht Durer - Bildnis eines unbekannten Mannes.jpg
In his 16th-century portrait of an unidentified man, Albrecht Dürer powerfully captures personality through facial expression, body language, and clothing. Work: Bildnis eines unbekannten Mannes (1521)

A frown (also known as a scowl) is a facial expression in which the eyebrows are brought together, and the forehead is wrinkled, usually indicating displeasure, sadness or worry, or less often confusion or concentration. The appearance of a frown varies by culture. An alternative usage in North America is thought of as an expression of the mouth. In those cases when used iconically, as with an emoticon, it is entirely presented by the curve of the lips forming a down-open curve. The mouth expression is also commonly referred to in the colloquial English phrase, especially in the United States, to "turn that frown upside down" which indicates changing from sad to happy.

Contents

Description

Charles Darwin described the primary act of frowning as the furrowing of the brow which leads to a rise in the upper lip and a down-turning of the corners of the mouth. [1] While the appearance of a frown varies from culture to culture, there appears to be some degree of universality to the recognition of the frown as a negative facial expression. [2] In fact, frowning as a component of anger or disgust is widely recognized as a universal expression easily recognized across cultures. [3] This universality suggests a shared adaptive quality to frowning allowing for social communication of negative emotional states. [4]

Photographs of frowning and crying children from The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals (1872) by Charles Darwin Illustration The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals by Charles Darwin.jpg
Photographs of frowning and crying children from The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals (1872) by Charles Darwin

Scott Fahlman first suggested the use of the colon with the left parenthesis to iconically represent a frowning face on the Internet in what has become a well-known emoticon. [5] In this form the frown is entirely presented as a curve of the lips facing away from the eyes. Specifically, frowns that incorporate the furrowing of the brow are a response to perceived obstacles to the achievement of goals, while frowns that involve movement of the cheeks reflect an unpleasant reaction. [6] Just as smiling alone can make one feel better, [7] frowning can make one feel worse. In a scientific study participants who held their faces in a frown ranked images as more unpleasant than participants who viewed the images with a neutral facial expression. [8] In a similar test, participants reported increased anger with the manipulated expression of a frown and they also ranked cartoons they saw as less funny than participants with the manipulated expression of a smile. [9]

Social behavior

An example of a spontaneous frown used to express displeasure. Mark Pearson Frown.png
An example of a spontaneous frown used to express displeasure.

In social settings frowns are most frequently used to express a range of negative emotions including anger and displeasure. However there are social differences that dictate who is allowed to frown in any given social setting. Socially dominant individuals are more likely to frown than those of a lower social status. Individuals with a high social status are permitted to display their emotions more freely, while low dominance individuals are expected to show signs of affiliation. [10] It is considered more socially acceptable for men to display negative emotions than women; women also tend to be less likely to frown than men. [11] Unlike smiling, frowns do not appear to be directly socially contagious; seeing someone frown does not necessarily make you frown. [12] However, in a scientific study participants that were subliminally exposed to frowning faces, were more likely to react with a frown when later shown a neutral face. [13] Frowns can also increase counter-empathy reactions. When the loser of a competition frowns it increases brain responses associated with pleasure in the winner, which is possibly related to the feeling of schadenfreude experienced when witnessing the misfortune of others. [14] Frowns also contribute to impressions formed even during brief encounters with other individuals. When shown a 30-second video clip (without audio) of a frowning college professor, students tend to rate the professor poorly on evaluations. [15]

Muscles used

Illustration of facial muscles and other tissue of the lateral human head and neck Lateral head anatomy.jpg
Illustration of facial muscles and other tissue of the lateral human head and neck

It is a long-held belief that it takes more muscles to frown than it does to smile. [16] It is difficult to determine exactly how many muscles are involved in smiling or frowning as there is a wide range of facial expressions that might be considered a frown or a smile. At minimum ten muscles are required to smile in which only the upper lip and corners of the mouth are lifted. [17] A similarly minimal frown requires only six muscles to lower the corners of the mouth. [17] According to plastic surgeon Dr. David H. Song of the University of Chicago Medical Center, however, frowning requires 11 muscles while smiling requires 12. [18] This method of counting the number of muscles used in generating a facial expression does not take into account the energy consumed by each muscle or the individual variability in facial muscles. While humans share facial musculature to express the universal emotions, some humans have more muscles in their faces and may use more of them when smiling or frowning. [19]

Muscles of facial expression [18]
FrowningSmiling
Platysma (2 muscles) Zygomaticus major (2 muscles)
Orbicularis oculi (2 muscles)Orbicularis oculi (2 muscles)
Corrugator supercilii (2 muscles) Levator labii superioris (2 muscles)
Procerus (1 muscle) Levator anguli oris (2 muscles)
Orbicularis oris (1 muscle) Risorius (2 muscles)
Mentalis (1 muscle) Zygomaticus minor (2 muscles)
Depressor anguli oris (2 muscles)
11 muscles total12 muscles total

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Smile</span> Conscious or unconscious facial muscular movement conveying happiness or pleasure

A smile is a facial expression formed primarily by flexing the muscles at the sides of the mouth. Some smiles include a contraction of the muscles at the corner of the eyes, an action known as a Duchenne smile. Among humans, a smile expresses delight, sociability, happiness, joy, or amusement. It is distinct from a similar but usually involuntary expression of anxiety known as a grimace. Although cross-cultural studies have shown that smiling is a means of communication throughout the world, there are large differences among different cultures, religions, and societies, with some using smiles to convey confusion, embarrassment or awkwardness.

Facial expression is the motion and positioning of the muscles beneath the skin of the face. These movements convey the emotional state of an individual to observers and are a form of nonverbal communication. They are a primary means of conveying social information between humans, but they also occur in most other mammals and some other animal species.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Body language</span> Type of nonverbal communication

Body language is a type of nonverbal communication in which physical behaviors, as opposed to words, are used to express or convey information. Such behavior includes facial expressions, body posture, gestures, eye movement, touch and the use of space. Although body language is an important part of communication, most of it happens without conscious awareness. In social communication, body language often complements verbal communication.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul Ekman</span> American psychologist (born 1934)

Paul Ekman is an American psychologist and professor emeritus at the University of California, San Francisco who is a pioneer in the study of emotions and their relation to facial expressions. He was ranked 59th out of the 100 most eminent psychologists of the twentieth century in 2002 by the Review of General Psychology.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Microexpression</span> Innate result of voluntary, involuntary, and conflicting emotional responses

A microexpression is a facial expression that only lasts for a short moment. It is the innate result of a voluntary and an involuntary emotional response occurring simultaneously and conflicting with one another, and occurs when the amygdala responds appropriately to the stimuli that the individual experiences and the individual wishes to conceal this specific emotion. This results in the individual very briefly displaying their true emotions followed by a false emotional reaction.

Amusement is the state of experiencing humorous and entertaining events or situations while the person or animal actively maintains the experience, and is associated with enjoyment, happiness, laughter and pleasure. It is an emotion with positive valence and high physiological arousal.

An emotional expression is a behavior that communicates an emotional state or attitude. It can be verbal or nonverbal, and can occur with or without self-awareness. Emotional expressions include facial movements like smiling or scowling, simple behaviors like crying, laughing, or saying "thank you," and more complex behaviors like writing a letter or giving a gift. Individuals have some conscious control of their emotional expressions; however, they need not have conscious awareness of their emotional or affective state in order to express emotion.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Emotionality</span>

Emotionality is the observable behavioral and physiological component of emotion. It is a measure of a person's emotional reactivity to a stimulus. Most of these responses can be observed by other people, while some emotional responses can only be observed by the person experiencing them. Observable responses to emotion do not have a single meaning. A smile can be used to express happiness or anxiety, while a frown can communicate sadness or anger. Emotionality is often used by experimental psychology researchers to operationalize emotion in research studies.

The facial feedback hypothesis, rooted in the conjectures of Charles Darwin and William James, is that one's facial expression directly affects their emotional experience. Specifically, physiological activation of the facial regions associated with certain emotions holds a direct effect on the elicitation of such emotional states, and the lack of or inhibition of facial activation will result in the suppression of corresponding emotional states.

Emotions are biocultural phenomena, meaning they are shaped by both evolution and culture. Emotions are "internal phenomena that can, but do not always, make themselves observable through expression and behavior". While some emotions are universal and are experienced in similar ways as a reaction to similar events across all cultures, other emotions show considerable cultural differences in their antecedent events, the way they are experienced, the reactions they provoke and the way they are perceived by the surrounding society. According to social constructionist theories, emotions are more deeply culturally influenced. The components of emotions are universal, but the patterns are social constructions. Some also theorize that culture is affected by the emotions of the people.

Discrete emotion theory is the claim that there is a small number of core emotions. For example, Silvan Tomkins concluded that there are nine basic affects which correspond with what we come to know as emotions: interest, enjoyment, surprise, distress, fear, anger, shame, dissmell and disgust. More recently, Carroll Izard at the University of Delaware factor analytically delineated 12 discrete emotions labeled: Interest, Joy, Surprise, Sadness, Anger, Disgust, Contempt, Self-Hostility, Fear, Shame, Shyness, and Guilt.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Emotion classification</span> Contrast of one emotion from another

Emotion classification, the means by which one may distinguish or contrast one emotion from another, is a contested issue in emotion research and in affective science. Researchers have approached the classification of emotions from one of two fundamental viewpoints:

  1. that emotions are discrete and fundamentally different constructs
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Emotional responsivity is the ability to acknowledge an affective stimuli by exhibiting emotion. It is a sharp change of emotion according to a person's emotional state. Increased emotional responsivity refers to demonstrating more response to a stimulus. Reduced emotional responsivity refers to demonstrating less response to a stimulus. Any response exhibited after exposure to the stimulus, whether it is appropriate or not, would be considered as an emotional response. Although emotional responsivity applies to nonclinical populations, it is more typically associated with individuals with schizophrenia and autism.

Paula M. Niedenthal is a social psychologist currently working as a professor of psychology at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. She also completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Wisconsin at Madison where she received a Bachelor's in Psychology. She then received her Ph.D. at the University of Michigan before becoming a faculty member of the departments of Psychology at Johns Hopkins University and Indiana University. Until recently, she served as the Director of Research in the National Centre for Scientific Research at the Université Blaise Pascal in Clermont-Ferrand France. The majority of Niedenthal's research focuses on several levels of analysis of emotional processes, this would include emotion-cognition interaction and representational models of emotion. Niedenthal has authored more than 80 articles and chapters, and several books. Niedenthal is a fellow of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology.

The study of the evolution of emotions dates back to the 19th century. Evolution and natural selection has been applied to the study of human communication, mainly by Charles Darwin in his 1872 work, The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals. Darwin researched the expression of emotions in an effort to support his materialist theory of unguided evolution. He proposed that much like other traits found in animals, emotions apparently also evolved and were adapted over time. His work looked at not only facial expressions in animals and specifically humans, but attempted to point out parallels between behaviors in humans and other animals.

Non-verbal leakage is a form of non-verbal behavior that occurs when a person verbalizes one thing, but their body language indicates another, common forms of which include facial movements and hand-to-face gestures. The term "non-verbal leakage" got its origin in literature in 1968, leading to many subsequent studies on the topic throughout the 1970s, with related studies continuing today.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Posture (psychology)</span> Aspect of nonverbal communication

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References

  1. ↑ Darwin, Charles R. (1872). The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals. London: John Murray. pp. 148–152.
  2. ↑ Russell, J.A. (1994). "Is there universal recognition of emotion from facial expressions? A review of the cross-cultural studies". Psychological Bulletin . 115 (1): 102–141. doi:10.1037/0033-2909.115.1.102. PMID   8202574. S2CID   4823006.
  3. ↑ Ekman, Paul (2004). Emotions revealed : recognizing faces and feelings to improve communication and emotional life (1 ed.). New York, N.Y.: Henry Holt and Co. p. 63. ISBN   0-8050-7516-X. OCLC   54433903.
  4. ↑ Izard, Carroll E. (1994). "Innate and Universal Facial Expressions: Evidence From Developmental and Cross-Cultural Research". Psychological Bulletin. 115 (2): 288–299. doi:10.1037/0033-2909.115.2.288. PMID   8165273.
  5. ↑ -) turns 25, Associated Press, 2007-09-20, archived from the original on 2007-10-12, retrieved 2007-09-20
  6. ↑ Pope, L.; Smith, C. (1994). "On the distinct meanings of smiles and frowns". Cognition & Emotion. 8: 65–72. doi:10.1080/02699939408408929.
  7. ↑ Strack, Fritz; Martin, L.; Stepper, S. (1988). "Inhibiting and facilitating conditions of the human smile: A non-obtrusive test of the facial feedback hypothesis". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology . 54 (5): 768–777. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.54.5.768. PMID   3379579. S2CID   15291233.
  8. ↑ Larsen, R.; Kasimatis, M.; Frey, K. (1992). "Facilitating the Furrowed Brow: An Unobtrusive Test of the Facial Feedback Hypothesis Applied to Unpleasant Affect". Cognition & Emotion. 6 (5): 321–338. doi:10.1080/02699939208409689. PMID   29022461.
  9. ↑ Smith, Craig A. (Mar 1989). "Dimensions of appraisal and physiological response in emotion". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 56 (3): 339–353. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.56.3.339. PMID   2926633.
  10. ↑ LaFrance, M.; Hect, M.A. (1999). "Option or obligation to smile: The effects of power and gender on facial expression.". In P.Phillipot; R.S. Feldman; E.J. Coars (eds.). The social context of nonverbal behavior. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. pp. 45–70. ISBN   978-0-521-58666-5.
  11. ↑ Hess, Ursula; Adams, R.B.; Kleck, R.E. (2005). "Who may frown and who should smile? Dominance, affiliation, and the display of happiness and anger" (PDF). Cognition and Emotion. 19 (4): 515–536. doi:10.1080/02699930441000364. S2CID   18739720. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2012-03-31. Retrieved 2011-08-26.
  12. ↑ Hinsz, V.B.; Tomhave, J.A. (1991). "Smile and (Half) the World Smiles with You, Frown and You Frown Alone". Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin . 17 (5): 586–592. doi:10.1177/0146167291175014. S2CID   33343894.
  13. ↑ Ulf, Dimberg; Thunberg, M.; Elmehed, K. (January 2000). "Unconscious Facial Reactions to Emotional Facial Expressions". Psychological Science . 11 (1): 86–89. CiteSeerX   10.1.1.508.2004 . doi:10.1111/1467-9280.00221. PMID   11228851. S2CID   67858.
  14. ↑ Yamada, M.; Lamm, C.; Decety, J. (2011). "Pleasing frowns, disappointing smiles: An ERP investigation of counterempathy". Emotion . 11 (6): 1336–1345. doi:10.1037/a0023854. PMID   21728414.
  15. ↑ Ambady, Nalini; Rosenthal, R. (1993). "Half a Minute: Predicting Teacher Evaluations From Thin Slices of Nonverbal Behavior and Physical Attractiveness". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 64 (3): 431–441. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.64.3.431. S2CID   16122351.
  16. ↑ Hix, John (1931). Strange As It Seems. New York: Sears Publishing Company. p. 224.
  17. 1 2 Scheve, Tom (2 June 2009). "How many muscles does it take to smile?". Discovery Fit & Health . Retrieved 29 August 2011.
  18. 1 2 Adams, Cecil (16 January 2004). "Does it take fewer muscles to smile than it does to frown?". The Straight Dope. Retrieved 26 August 2011.
  19. ↑ Waller, Bridget M.; Cray, James J.; Burrows, Anne M. (2008). "Selection for Universal Facial Emotion". Emotion. 8 (3): 435–439. CiteSeerX   10.1.1.612.9868 . doi:10.1037/1528-3542.8.3.435. PMID   18540761.
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