A team of researchers from Nottingham Trent University (NTU, UK) has concluded that individuals with expressive faces are more socially successful and appear more likable to people around them. Facial expressiveness also helps them negotiate more effectively, according to a report by the Independent.
What the Researchers Discovered
The findings are based on an analysis of over 1,500 conversations, focusing on facial muscle movements such as smiling, raising eyebrows, wrinkling the nose, and pulling the corners of the mouth.
The research team, led by Bridget Waller, a professor of evolution and social behavior in the psychology department at NTU, says this study helps explain why humans have more complex facial expressions than any other species.
“Our comparisons between humans and other primates show that people, in general, make more facial movements and have more expressive faces,” Professor Waller said.
“Expressiveness makes us more attractive, which can ease social interactions, providing a clear evolutionary advantage,” she added.
In the first part of the study, the researchers showed video clips of conversations to more than 170 people and asked them to rate how pleasant—based on emotions and expressions—and how likable the people in the videos seemed.
Next, the team analyzed Zoom chats among 1,456 strangers, during which participants evaluated how much they liked each other. The researchers found that during these social interactions, each person made an average of 71 facial movements per minute.
Expressive individuals were preferred by both independent evaluators and their conversation partners.
The scientists also created a conflict scenario in which participants were offered an unfavorable deal. Professor Waller says participants were asked to decide how to best split a monetary reward between themselves and a decoy — an experimenter posing as a regular participant.
The experimenter proposed an unfair division, attempting to take 80 percent of the reward. Meanwhile, the researchers assessed how well participants negotiated and what they ultimately agreed upon.
“Half of the participants accepted less than 50 percent of the reward (poor negotiations), while the other half split the reward equally (good negotiations),” the team said.
The team also found that participants who combined a pleasant demeanor with expressive facial movements achieved the best outcomes during negotiations.
Lead author Dr. Aitne Cavanagh says this is the first large-scale study dedicated to examining facial expression in real interactions. It indicates that people with expressive faces are more successful in building relationships. This trait may also play a significant role in conflict resolution.
This research is part of the Facediff project, funded by the European Research Council.
The results of the study were published in the journal Scientific Reports.
