Reading Body Language
Japanese vs American
by Kevin Hogan
Reading body language is very different for many
Japanese than it is for Americans.
And this research could be ground breaking for
the next evolution of interpreting and decoding
body language.
Read on and you'll see what I mean...
The Determining Factor for Interpreting Facial
Emotions
Research has uncovered that culture is a
determining factor when interpreting facial
emotions. The study reveals that in cultures where
emotional control is the standard, such as
Japan, focus is placed on the eyes
to interpret emotions. Whereas in cultures where emotion
is openly expressed, such as the United
States, the focus is on the mouth to
interpret emotion.
Across two studies, using computerized icons
and human images, the researchers compared how
Japanese and American cultures interpreted images,
which conveyed a range of emotions.
Basic Emotions Universally Recognized?
"These findings go against the popular theory
that the facial expressions of basic emotions can
be universally recognized," said University
of Alberta researcher Dr. Takahiko Masuda. "A
person's culture plays a very strong role in
determining how they will perceive emotions and
needs to be considered when interpreting facial
expression"
These cultural differences are even
noticeable in computer emoticons, which are
used to convey a writer's emotions over email and
text messaging. Consistent with the research
findings, the Japanese emoticons for happiness and
sadness vary in terms of how the eyes are
depicted, while American emoticons vary with the
direction of the mouth.
In the United States the emoticons : ) and : -
) denote a happy face, whereas the emoticons :( or
: - ( denote a sad face. However, Japanese tend to
use the symbol (^_^) to indicate a happy face, and
(;_;) to indicate a sad face.
When participants were asked to rate the
perceived levels of happiness or sadness expressed
through the different computer emoticons, the
researchers found that the Japanese still looked
to the eyes of the emoticons to determine its
emotion.
"We think it is quite interesting and
appropriate that a culture that tends to masks its
emotions, such as Japan, would focus on a person's
eyes when determining emotion, as eyes tend to be
quite subtle," said Masuda. "In the
United States, where overt emotion is quite
common, it makes sense to focus on the mouth,
which is the most expressive feature on a person's
face."
Japanese Advantage in Detecting Liars?
The results also suggest the interesting
possibility that the Japanese may be better than
Americans at detecting "false smiles".
If the position of the eyes is the key to whether
someone's smile is false or true, Japanese may be
particularly good at detecting whether someone is
lying or being "fake". However, these
questions can only be answered with future
research.
These findings are published in the current
issue of The Journal of Experimental Social
Psychology and are a result from a collaborative
study between Masaki Yuki (Hokkaido University),
William Maddux (INSEAD) and Takahiko Masuda
(University of Alberta).
Posted 4/6/2007
