It seems like a pretty straightforward question, but recognizing signs of pain in other people can be tricky. Not only is this an interesting intellectual question, but the ability to recognize pain can literally have life or death consequences. Many doctors are tasked with diagnosing a problem based only on the expression of pain by…
Read MorePain and it’s Similarities with other Basic Emotions
We have written a great deal about recognizing basic emotions, but what about pain? Certainly, pain has many similarities with other basic emotions, given its deep evolutionary basis and the universal nature of the pain experience. However, further attention must be paid to how we recognize expressions of pain as opposed to those of other…
Read MoreUniversal Laughter and Deception
Is laughter recognized in the same way across cultures? And, if so, can we tell if people in different cultures are faking their laughter? This is exactly what a team of researchers attempted to answer in a recent publication in Psychological Science. An astoundingly large group of 31 researchers sought to analyze reactions to laughter…
Read MoreReading Hairstyles?
We focus a lot on reading people’s nonverbal behavior, but is there something to be read into about our hairstyles also? This is precisely what Humintell’s Drs. David Matsumoto and Hyisung Hwang argue in a recent paper. Essentially, while past research has argued that emotional expressions can reveal one’s culture, they argue that differing hairstyles,…
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