“Written all over your face”

Facial expressions: indicators of underlying emotion

Art Exhibition

Graeme Pettifer – elective project

Education Pack

“Written all over your face”

Facial expressions: indicators of underlying emotion

Introduction

This education pack accompanies an exhibition that may seem surplus to requirements. It could be

argued that our life experiences to date, are more than adequate in providing us with the

prerequisite skills for evaluating what is “written all over their face.” Indeed, when we experience

extreme ends of the spectrum of certain emotions, very few of us can conceal our true underlying

emotional state. However, consider times when we have made an error in judgement in how

someone feels; be it with someone we know, or a complete stranger on the street. These

interactions are often complicated by the desire to mask one’s feelings, or are influenced by cultural

values that support the suppression of true emotional expression. In these cases, hindsight is often

the only tool we have at our disposal, after the dust has settled and emotions are laid bare. Regret

can pervade, and the promise to approach things differently, is made in an effort to atone for a

“misreading” of the situation. In addition, our reading of situations is often complicated by our own

emotional overtones, polluting our ability to read tense situations in an objective manner.

Using the medium of art, this body of work aims to impart important information about the

interpretation of facial expressions. Hopefully, it will teach us to look with greater scrutiny, at

someone’s physical projection of their true feelings; thereby facilitating an ability to approach

emotionally charged situations, in a flexible dynamic fashion. This enables us to alter our

interactions with others in a sensitive manner, maximising our effectiveness as communicators. This

is particularly pertinent in the clinical environment.

The pieces on display and contained in this pack, are based on the lifetime’s work of the

psychologist Professor Paul Ekman . Through his work, he has managed to prove that certain facial

expressions are reflexive to core underlying emotional states: notably, sadness, anger, surprise, fear,

disgust and contempt. My suggestion for your navigation around the show and this resource, would

be to read the educational pieces, have a practice at reproducing the facial expressions yourself

(using a mirror), and then appraise the pictures at the end, to test your new found knowledge.

Hopefully you can then start to use your new found skills straight away.

If you would like to follow this up further, Professor Ekman has published many books that

read easily, and may indeed take you one step further than this exhibition can. If reading is not your

thing, then his work has been serialised in the American HBO production Lie to Me, with Tim Roth.

The stories are obviously overt embellishments of reality, but the science is sound, and the series

uses real life clips of famous celebrities and politicians to make its point. This series temporarily

threatened my successful completion of the course, such was my commitment to completing this

“educational material” in a short a space of time as possible. I cannot endorse it enough.

Prior to my elective, I spent 7 weeks on a stroke ward with patients that cannot verbalise; I

would challenge anyone that this is not of value.

How to Approach the ..... Faces

The basic face pictures are designed to illustrate, in simple terms, how just a slight change in facial

features can dramatically change the perception of mood and underlying emotion. The mundane

line drawing of a face illustrates that just a change in the orientation of a line, dramatically alters the

perceived emotional state.

Go through them in sequential order, as in sequence, they represent a scale of severity of how

strongly that emotion is felt. Each subsequent expression has an additional feature added on to the

last face viewed, building the magnitude of the response in a temporal sequence. Look out for the

colourless bubbles, as these represent the most reliable indicators of when someone is experiencing

that particular emotion, but trying to suppress it; in real life situations, this might be the only

element of the full repertoire expressed. These bubbles also contain other interesting facts.

Try to then replicate those facial expressions yourself in one of the mirrors available.

Once you think you have mastered these, have a look at the pictures on display or at the back of this

booklet, and decide for yourself what you think the underlying emotional experience is. At times

they are perhaps deliberately ambiguous, though on closer inspection, and using the principles

acquired through doing the face exercises, you should be able to crack it.

Enjoy

Anger

Neutral

face

Eyebrows

lowered and

pulled together

Perplexity, confusion,

concentration and

determination can also

be shown by this action

Upper eyelids

raised

Narrowing

of the lips

Narrowing of the

lips is the most

obvious subtle

sign that people

find difficult to

hide, when

feeling angry

Bearing of

the teeth

Interestingly, bearing of

the teeth is very much a

western phenomenon;

used as a visual indicator

of anger. In Papa New

Guinea it was found that

lips pursed together was

the equivalent. This

suggested that individuals

were using the valsalva

manoeuvre, readying

themselves for physical

combat; something

avoided in western

culture

Disgust

Neutral face

Upper lip raised

as high as it will

go

Lower lip raised

and protrudes

slightly.

Nasolabial folds

deepen,

forming an

inverted U.

Wrinkling of the

bridge of the

nose

Raising of the

cheeks, with a

lowering of the

brow creates crow’s

feet

Fear

Neutral face

Upper eye lids

raised as high as

possible

Jaw open with the

mouth stretched

horizontally towards

each ear

Eyebrows raised

as high as they

can go

Eyebrows pulled

together whilst still

raised

Elements of fear as an

expression, can also be seen

in surprise; for example the

raised eyebrows and elevated

upper eyelids

Sadness

Neutral

Face

Inner corners of

the eyebrows

pulled up

Eyebrows are the

most reliable sign

of sadness

Corners of the

lips pulled down

Mouth dropped

open

This mouth sign in

the absence of any

eye signs, can just

signify disbelief or

negation

Raised cheeks, as if

squinting

Looking down,

upper eyelids

drooping

This eye sign is

characteristic of

sadness

1. 2.

3.

4. 5.

6. 7.

Answers:

1. Surprise

2. Neutral

3. Sadness

4. Anger

5. Disgust

6. Fear

7. Sadness