The concept of facial feedback dates back to the 19th century when Charles Darwin, the renowned naturalist and author of “The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals,” proposed that facial expressions might play a role in emotional experience. Darwin suggested that facial expressions are not just outward manifestations of emotions but can also influence the internal experience of those emotions.
The concept of facial feedback dates back to the 19th century when Charles Darwin, the renowned naturalist and author of “The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals,” proposed that facial expressions might play a role in emotional experience. Darwin suggested that facial expressions are not just outward manifestations of emotions but can also influence the internal experience of those emotions.
However, it wasn’t until the 20th century that researchers began to systematically study the relationship between facial expressions and emotions. One of the key figures in this research was psychologist Sylvan Tomkins, who proposed that facial expressions were integral to the experience of emotions. Tomkins suggested that different facial expressions were associated with specific emotions and that changing one’s facial expression could alter their emotional state.
Early Experimental Research
The first empirical evidence supporting the facial feedback hypothesis came from a series of experiments conducted by psychologist Fritz Strack and his colleagues in the late 1980s. In one of their experiments, participants were asked to hold a pen in their mouths in a way that either forced a smile or a frown without their awareness. They were then shown cartoons and asked to rate how funny they found them.
The results were intriguing. Participants who were “smiling” due to the pen in their mouths rated the cartoons as funnier than those who were “frowning.” This suggested that the physical act of smiling, even if induced artificially, could influence how people perceived and experienced humor.
Further research by other psychologists provided additional support for the facial feedback hypothesis. For example, a study published in the journal “Psychological Science” in 2012 found that participants who held a chopstick with their teeth to create a smile reported more positive emotions compared to those who held the chopstick with their lips to create a neutral expression.
The Role of Mirror Neurons
One proposed mechanism underlying the facial feedback hypothesis involves mirror neurons, a type of brain cell that fires both when we perform an action and when we observe someone else performing the same action. Mirror neurons are thought to play a crucial role in understanding and imitating the actions and emotions of others.
When we smile, our mirror neurons may detect this facial expression and signal to our brain that we are experiencing happiness. This internal feedback loop reinforces the emotion we are feeling. Conversely, when we frown or display other negative facial expressions, mirror neurons may contribute to the experience of negative emotions.
Cultural and Individual Differences
It’s important to note that the relationship between facial expressions and emotions is not entirely straightforward and can be influenced by cultural and individual differences. Different cultures may have varying norms and interpretations of facial expressions. Additionally, individuals may vary in their sensitivity to facial feedback, with some people being more responsive to these cues than others.
Cultural norms can shape how people express and interpret emotions through facial expressions. For example, in some cultures, smiling may be seen as a sign of politeness or social conformity rather than an indicator of happiness. Consequently, the impact of facial feedback on emotions may be less pronounced in such cultural contexts.
Individual differences in emotional regulation and expression can also play a role. Some individuals may naturally have a stronger connection between their facial expressions and emotions, while others may be less influenced by these cues.
Practical Implications
The facial feedback hypothesis has practical implications in various areas, including psychology, therapy, and everyday life:
1. Emotion Regulation:
Understanding the role of facial expressions in emotional experiences can be useful in emotion regulation strategies. For example, individuals who want to boost their mood can consciously engage in activities that involve smiling, such as watching funny videos or simply smiling at themselves in the mirror.
2. Therapy and Mental Health:
Therapists and counselors may incorporate techniques related to facial feedback into their practice. Encouraging clients to practice positive facial expressions can be a part of cognitive-behavioral therapy or other therapeutic approaches aimed at improving mood and emotional well-being.
3. Nonverbal Communication:
Recognizing the influence of facial expressions on emotions can enhance our understanding of nonverbal communication. It reminds us that facial expressions can convey not only our current emotional state but also influence the emotions of those around us.
4. Everyday Happiness:
In our daily lives, we can use the facial feedback hypothesis to our advantage. If we find ourselves feeling down, intentionally engaging in activities that make us smile or laugh can help improve our mood.
Criticisms and Controversies
While the facial feedback hypothesis has garnered empirical support and offers valuable insights into the mind-body connection, it is not without its critics and controversies:
1. Replication Issues:
Some studies attempting to replicate the original findings have encountered challenges, and the effects observed in subsequent research have sometimes been weaker or less consistent.
2. Alternative Explanations:
Critics argue that the observed effects could be attributed to demand characteristics (participants guessing the study’s purpose and responding accordingly) or placebo effects (participants expecting certain outcomes and therefore experiencing them).
3. Complex Emotion:
Emotions are complex, multifaceted experiences influenced by numerous factors, including cognitive appraisal, cultural context, and individual differences. While facial expressions may play a role, they are unlikely to be the sole determinant of emotional states.
4. Limited Generalizability:
The influence of facial feedback on emotions may vary among individuals and across different emotional states. It may not apply universally to all people and emotions.
The Ongoing Exploration of Emotion
The facial feedback hypothesis represents a fascinating aspect of the intricate relationship between our bodies and our emotions. While the theory has faced its share of criticisms and challenges, it has contributed to our understanding of how physical expressions can influence our emotional experiences. As researchers continue to investigate this phenomenon and its nuances, we gain deeper insights into the rich tapestry of human emotions and the intricate ways in which they are woven into our daily lives.
Examples:
Candle Problem: Struggle to see a box of thumbtacks as a candle holder.
Wine Bottle as a Vase: Overlooking using an empty wine bottle as a vase.
Improvised Tools: Failure to use everyday objects as improvised tools for specific tasks.
Newspaper as Packing Material: When moving or shipping items, individuals may not consider using old newspapers as padding or insulation because they typically see them as reading material.
Shoe as a Hammer: In the absence of a hammer, someone might not think of using the heel of a shoe to drive in a nail.
Spoon Handle as a Doorstop: People might not realize that a spoon handle can effectively hold a door open when they don’t have access to a traditional doorstop.
Scarf as a Belt: Functional fixedness can limit one’s fashion creativity, making them overlook the possibility of using a scarf as a belt.
Trash Bag as Rain Poncho: In unexpected rain, someone might not think of using a large trash bag as an improvised rain poncho.
CD Case as Bagel Holder: People may not think to use an empty CD case to hold a bagel in a way that keeps it from getting squished.
Binder Clips as Cord Organizers: Individuals may not see binder clips as handy cord organizers, helping to prevent tangled cables.
Shower Cap as Shoe Protector: When packing shoes in a suitcase, someone might not consider using a disposable shower cap to cover the soles and keep clothes clean.
Functional Fixedness: Key Takeaways
Functional Fixedness: A cognitive bias where individuals tend to see objects or concepts only in their traditionally intended uses, limiting creativity and problem-solving.
Characteristics:
Traditional Usage: Objects perceived with limitations in their typical functions.
Impaired Creativity: Hinders innovative and unconventional thinking.
Problem-Solving Barriers: Creates obstacles to finding alternative solutions to a problem.
Use Cases:
Tool Use: Difficulty identifying alternative uses for familiar tools.
Engineering Design: Overlooking unconventional applications for materials or components.
Problem-Solving Tasks: Affects creativity in solving complex problems.
Benefits:
Tradition and Stability: Maintains stability and order in object usage.
Efficient Thinking: Allows quick identification of familiar object functions.
Preservation of Purpose: Maintains the intended purpose of objects.
Convergent thinking occurs when the solution to a problem can be found by applying established rules and logical reasoning. Whereas divergent thinking is an unstructured problem-solving method where participants are encouraged to develop many innovative ideas or solutions to a given problem. Where convergent thinking might work for larger, mature organizations where divergent thinking is more suited for startups and innovative companies.
The concept of cognitive biases was introduced and popularized by the work of Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman in 1972. Biases are seen as systematic errors and flaws that make humans deviate from the standards of rationality, thus making us inept at making good decisions under uncertainty.
Second-order thinking is a means of assessing the implications of our decisions by considering future consequences. Second-order thinking is a mental model that considers all future possibilities. It encourages individuals to think outside of the box so that they can prepare for every and eventuality. It also discourages the tendency for individuals to default to the most obvious choice.
Lateral thinking is a business strategy that involves approaching a problem from a different direction. The strategy attempts to remove traditionally formulaic and routine approaches to problem-solving by advocating creative thinking, therefore finding unconventional ways to solve a known problem. This sort of non-linear approach to problem-solving, can at times, create a big impact.
Bounded rationality is a concept attributed to Herbert Simon, an economist and political scientist interested in decision-making and how we make decisions in the real world. In fact, he believed that rather than optimizing (which was the mainstream view in the past decades) humans follow what he called satisficing.
The Dunning-Kruger effect describes a cognitive bias where people with low ability in a task overestimate their ability to perform that task well. Consumers or businesses that do not possess the requisite knowledge make bad decisions. What’s more, knowledge gaps prevent the person or business from seeing their mistakes.
Occam’s Razor states that one should not increase (beyond reason) the number of entities required to explain anything. All things being equal, the simplest solution is often the best one. The principle is attributed to 14th-century English theologian William of Ockham.
The Lindy Effect is a theory about the ageing of non-perishable things, like technology or ideas. Popularized by author Nicholas Nassim Taleb, the Lindy Effect states that non-perishable things like technology age – linearly – in reverse. Therefore, the older an idea or a technology, the same will be its life expectancy.
Antifragility was first coined as a term by author, and options trader Nassim Nicholas Taleb. Antifragility is a characteristic of systems that thrive as a result of stressors, volatility, and randomness. Therefore, Antifragile is the opposite of fragile. Where a fragile thing breaks up to volatility; a robust thing resists volatility. An antifragile thing gets stronger from volatility (provided the level of stressors and randomness doesn’t pass a certain threshold).
Systems thinking is a holistic means of investigating the factors and interactions that could contribute to a potential outcome. It is about thinking non-linearly, and understanding the second-order consequences of actions and input into the system.
Vertical thinking, on the other hand, is a problem-solving approach that favors a selective, analytical, structured, and sequential mindset. The focus of vertical thinking is to arrive at a reasoned, defined solution.
Maslow’s Hammer, otherwise known as the law of the instrument or the Einstellung effect, is a cognitive bias causing an over-reliance on a familiar tool. This can be expressed as the tendency to overuse a known tool (perhaps a hammer) to solve issues that might require a different tool. This problem is persistent in the business world where perhaps known tools or frameworks might be used in the wrong context (like business plans used as planning tools instead of only investors’ pitches).
The Peter Principle was first described by Canadian sociologist Lawrence J. Peter in his 1969 book The Peter Principle. The Peter Principle states that people are continually promoted within an organization until they reach their level of incompetence.
The straw man fallacy describes an argument that misrepresents an opponent’s stance to make rebuttal more convenient. The straw man fallacy is a type of informal logical fallacy, defined as a flaw in the structure of an argument that renders it invalid.
The Streisand Effect is a paradoxical phenomenon where the act of suppressing information to reduce visibility causes it to become more visible. In 2003, Streisand attempted to suppress aerial photographs of her Californian home by suing photographer Kenneth Adelman for an invasion of privacy. Adelman, who Streisand assumed was paparazzi, was instead taking photographs to document and study coastal erosion. In her quest for more privacy, Streisand’s efforts had the opposite effect.
As highlighted by German psychologist Gerd Gigerenzer in the paper “Heuristic Decision Making,” the term heuristic is of Greek origin, meaning “serving to find out or discover.” More precisely, a heuristic is a fast and accurate way to make decisions in the real world, which is driven by uncertainty.
The recognition heuristic is a psychological model of judgment and decision making. It is part of a suite of simple and economical heuristics proposed by psychologists Daniel Goldstein and Gerd Gigerenzer. The recognition heuristic argues that inferences are made about an object based on whether it is recognized or not.
The representativeness heuristic was first described by psychologists Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky. The representativeness heuristic judges the probability of an event according to the degree to which that event resembles a broader class. When queried, most will choose the first option because the description of John matches the stereotype we may hold for an archaeologist.
The take-the-best heuristic is a decision-making shortcut that helps an individual choose between several alternatives. The take-the-best (TTB) heuristic decides between two or more alternatives based on a single good attribute, otherwise known as a cue. In the process, less desirable attributes are ignored.
The bundling bias is a cognitive bias in e-commerce where a consumer tends not to use all of the products bought as a group, or bundle. Bundling occurs when individual products or services are sold together as a bundle. Common examples are tickets and experiences. The bundling bias dictates that consumers are less likely to use each item in the bundle. This means that the value of the bundle and indeed the value of each item in the bundle is decreased.
The Barnum Effect is a cognitive bias where individuals believe that generic information – which applies to most people – is specifically tailored for themselves.
First-principles thinking – sometimes called reasoning from first principles – is used to reverse-engineer complex problems and encourage creativity. It involves breaking down problems into basic elements and reassembling them from the ground up. Elon Musk is among the strongest proponents of this way of thinking.
The ladder of inference is a conscious or subconscious thinking process where an individual moves from a fact to a decision or action. The ladder of inference was created by academic Chris Argyris to illustrate how people form and then use mental models to make decisions.
Goodhart’s Law is named after British monetary policy theorist and economist Charles Goodhart. Speaking at a conference in Sydney in 1975, Goodhart said that “any observed statistical regularity will tend to collapse once pressure is placed upon it for control purposes.” Goodhart’s Law states that when a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.
The Six Thinking Hats model was created by psychologist Edward de Bono in 1986, who noted that personality type was a key driver of how people approached problem-solving. For example, optimists view situations differently from pessimists. Analytical individuals may generate ideas that a more emotional person would not, and vice versa.
The Mandela effect is a phenomenon where a large group of people remembers an event differently from how it occurred. The Mandela effect was first described in relation to Fiona Broome, who believed that former South African President Nelson Mandela died in prison during the 1980s. While Mandela was released from prison in 1990 and died 23 years later, Broome remembered news coverage of his death in prison and even a speech from his widow. Of course, neither event occurred in reality. But Broome was later to discover that she was not the only one with the same recollection of events.
The bandwagon effect tells us that the more a belief or idea has been adopted by more people within a group, the more the individual adoption of that idea might increase within the same group. This is the psychological effect that leads to herd mentality. What in marketing can be associated with social proof.
Moore’s law states that the number of transistors on a microchip doubles approximately every two years. This observation was made by Intel co-founder Gordon Moore in 1965 and it become a guiding principle for the semiconductor industry and has had far-reaching implications for technology as a whole.
Disruptive innovation as a term was first described by Clayton M. Christensen, an American academic and business consultant whom The Economist called “the most influential management thinker of his time.” Disruptive innovation describes the process by which a product or service takes hold at the bottom of a market and eventually displaces established competitors, products, firms, or alliances.
Value migration was first described by author Adrian Slywotzky in his 1996 book Value Migration – How to Think Several Moves Ahead of the Competition. Value migration is the transferal of value-creating forces from outdated business models to something better able to satisfy consumer demands.
The bye-now effect describes the tendency for consumers to think of the word “buy” when they read the word “bye”. In a study that tracked diners at a name-your-own-price restaurant, each diner was asked to read one of two phrases before ordering their meal. The first phrase, “so long”, resulted in diners paying an average of $32 per meal. But when diners recited the phrase “bye bye” before ordering, the average price per meal rose to $45.
Groupthink occurs when well-intentioned individuals make non-optimal or irrational decisions based on a belief that dissent is impossible or on a motivation to conform. Groupthink occurs when members of a group reach a consensus without critical reasoning or evaluation of the alternatives and their consequences.
A stereotype is a fixed and over-generalized belief about a particular group or class of people. These beliefs are based on the false assumption that certain characteristics are common to every individual residing in that group. Many stereotypes have a long and sometimes controversial history and are a direct consequence of various political, social, or economic events. Stereotyping is the process of making assumptions about a person or group of people based on various attributes, including gender, race, religion, or physical traits.
Murphy’s Law states that if anything can go wrong, it will go wrong. Murphy’s Law was named after aerospace engineer Edward A. Murphy. During his time working at Edwards Air Force Base in 1949, Murphy cursed a technician who had improperly wired an electrical component and said, “If there is any way to do it wrong, he’ll find it.”
The law of unintended consequences was first mentioned by British philosopher John Locke when writing to parliament about the unintended effects of interest rate rises. However, it was popularized in 1936 by American sociologist Robert K. Merton who looked at unexpected, unanticipated, and unintended consequences and their impact on society.
Fundamental attribution error is a bias people display when judging the behavior of others. The tendency is to over-emphasize personal characteristics and under-emphasize environmental and situational factors.
Outcome bias describes a tendency to evaluate a decision based on its outcome and not on the process by which the decision was reached. In other words, the quality of a decision is only determined once the outcome is known. Outcome bias occurs when a decision is based on the outcome of previous events without regard for how those events developed.
Hindsight bias is the tendency for people to perceive past events as more predictable than they actually were. The result of a presidential election, for example, seems more obvious when the winner is announced. The same can also be said for the avid sports fan who predicted the correct outcome of a match regardless of whether their team won or lost. Hindsight bias, therefore, is the tendency for an individual to convince themselves that they accurately predicted an event before it happened.
Gennaro is the creator of FourWeekMBA, which reached about four million business people, comprising C-level executives, investors, analysts, product managers, and aspiring digital entrepreneurs in 2022 alone | He is also Director of Sales for a high-tech scaleup in the AI Industry | In 2012, Gennaro earned an International MBA with emphasis on Corporate Finance and Business Strategy.
