This is an interesting article from the Japan Times:

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fe20091011rh.html

Sunday, Oct. 11, 2009

NATURAL SELECTIONS
In cross-cultural situations, remember those emoticons

By ROWAN HOOPER

"My first child was born on December 27th, 1839, and I at once commenced to make notes on the first dawn of the various expressions which he exhibited."

It will come as no surprise to many readers that this is a quote from the ever observant and curious English naturalist Charles Darwin (1809-82), originator of the theory of evolution by natural selection.

He was convinced that all facial expressions were universal in all people, and even in animals, and that they must have a "gradual and natural origin."

Darwin set out his argument in his book, "The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals," published in 1872. There he states his belief that, "The young and the old of widely different races, both with man and animals, express the same state of mind by the same movements."

Then I came across a paper that challenges one of Darwin's arguments — that facial expressions are universal.

As any Japanese who has lived in the West, or Westerner who has lived in Japan, will readily agree, there are obviously strong cultural differences at work in our societies.

People from Japan and China generally have a tougher time than those from European countries in telling the difference between a face that looks fearful versus one that looks surprised. Similarly, East Asians have more trouble distinguishing a face showing disgust from one that is displaying anger.

Now scientists think they've figured it out: When examining a face, Easterners fixate their attention on the eyes, whereas Westerners scan evenly across the face.

"We show that Easterners and Westerners look at different face features to read facial expressions," said Rachael Jack of the University of Glasgow, in Scotland. "Westerners look at the eyes and the mouth in equal measure, whereas Easterners favor the eyes and neglect the mouth. This means that Easterners have difficulty distinguishing facial expressions that look similar around the eye region."

The discovery shows that human communication of emotion is a lot more complex than we thought — and even than Darwin thought. As a result, facial expressions that had been considered universally recognizable cannot be used to reliably convey emotion in cross-cultural situations.

Does this strike a chord with any Westerners living in Japan? Or Japanese when interacting with Westerners?

Certainly, I can understand it. There are many occasions when expressions and emotions may be misunderstood, and this research might provide part of an explanation as to why that happens so frequently.

Jack and colleagues investigated cultural differences in the recognition of facial expressions by recording the eye movements of 13 Western Caucasian and 13 East Asian people while they observed pictures of expressive faces. They then put them into categories: happy, sad, surprised, fearful, disgusted, angry, or neutral.

The faces were standardized according to something called the Facial Action Coding System (FACS). This sets each expression as displaying a specific combination of facial muscles typically associated with each feeling of emotion. The researchers then compared how accurately participants read those facial expressions using their particular eye-movement strategies.

It turned out that Easterners focused much greater attention on the eyes, and made significantly more errors than Westerners did. In other words, while Westerners use the whole face to convey emotion, Easterners use the eyes more and the mouth less.

And interestingly, this cultural difference extends to cyberspace.

Emoticons — text marks used to convey facial expressions of the writer's mood — are different in Japan and the West.

In the West, the commonest emoticons for "happy" and "sad" use the mouth to convey the emotion, so we have : ) and : (

In Japan, however, the eyes are used to convey the emotions, so ^.^ is commonly used for happy and ;-; for sad.

"Emoticons are used to convey different emotions in cyberspace as they are the iconic representation of facial expressions," Jack said. "Interestingly, there are clear cultural differences in the formations of these icons."

In summary, the researchers say, there are real perceptual differences between Western Caucasian and East Asian people. However, I doubt whether that applies to Caucasians who have grown up in Japan, or Japanese who have grown up in America, for example. It's all about the culture you grow up in — your so-called nurture rather than nature.

But, without overgeneralizing, it does help us understand how attempts to communicate emotions sometimes get lost in translation.

i am quite certain that when the human face is looked at, different cultures tend to focus on different
features before drawing a conclusion about the general "lookability" of the person. this in turn, could
possibly explain why there is a east/west divide on facial expressions.

yes, as the article claims, asians tend to focus a great deal of attention on the eyes. just look at
japan, all the teenagers use all sorts of articial methods (mostly temporary) to enhance the size
and to manipulate the shape of their eyes. this trend has gone on to enjoy much success in the
other asian countries as well (e.g. taiwan, china, HK). in south korea, where alot of popular tv
shows are being churned out these days, alot of the actors/actresses have big eyes, almost to
a level of cartoon perfection.

to many westerners however, they do not have a tendency to focus on any one particular
feature. instead, they would naturally look at the face in its entirety. things like a strong jawline,
high cheekbones etc are looked at it greater detail with the other features, before judgement is passed
on whether a person qualifies as good-looking.

this i think has an implication on how facial expressions are construed as suggested by the article. interestingly,
there is this particular emoticon which is default on 141 which may conjure up different intepretations:




my first instinct would be to focus on the movement of the eyes here. almost naturally, this is a negative
emoticon and i would associate it with sarcasm or a superiority complex vis the opinions of others.

however, if i were to to look at the 'full picture', there is a smile and not a very condescending one at that.
it is almost tongue-in-cheek like, not in anyway offensive and probably used to express a friendly jibe at a buddy.

of course the context of how this particular emoticon is used is important and the words probably will be
conclusive as to its nature and purpose of use, but at first glance, instinctively is it positive or negative?

but most emoticons (here on 141 at least) do away with ambuigity i think. usually very clear cut whether it is
good or bad, whatever your inclination to facial expressions may be.

Actually, prior to coming across this article in the Japan Times, I'd never given this any thought. But thinking back on it, I can remember numerous times when Asians, particularly Japanese, have completely misread my facial expressions. Asians seem especially inept at picking up on sarcasm or irony.

Also, this emphasizing mouth over eye thing might explain why so many Japanese manga are drawn with large expressive eyes and tiny slash lines for mouths.

This was one of my first impressions upon arriving in Asia last year.  Although I am an American, my humor tends toward dry British sarcasm and irony.  In the US, I could use some simple sarcasm like, "Wow, she's really hot!" and roll my eyes and everyone would know exactly what I meant.  In SE Asia, 90 percent of the time the same statement would fly right over people's heads.  "You think she's hot?  I don't think she's pretty at all" would be the usual response here.  It's gotten so that I have pretty much given up on humor...

Clearly there is some cross-cultural miscommunication going on.  It could be facial...  Sarcasm relies on clues to indicate that the remark is sarcasm...  like the rolling of the eyes, or a wry smile.  So perhaps the Asians are not trained at picking up the specific facial message.  We Westerners also use tonal shifts (or emphasis) to indicate irony.  So "She's REALLY hot" or "She's really HOT" would indicate a serious statement, whereas "SHE'S really hot" would more likely signal sarcam.  Given that tonal shifts convey more direct meaning in SE Asia, perhaps these tones are confusing to Asians who think that English has no tones.  Or perhaps it's simply a matter of not knowing the signals...

Whatever the reason, I'm really glad that I now live in a cross-cultural environment where I get to observe these differences and ponder them.  And a place where really beautiful and loving women are for hire for little money...  

Have fun, CGP

In an interesting contrast, Hello Kitty has no mouth usually, except for certain actions like gasping, when it's a small dot. Some claim her having no mouth is to sell more product, since lack of mouth means she shows fewer emotions, or neutrality, and thus would allow more people to "connect" with her face no matter what mood they're in.

I think what Darwin was talking about was laughs and frowns etc, which are still pretty universal. Other expressions are probably results of conditioning, and culture specific.

I think our ability to read faces is calibrated by what we see every day, which leads to people saying everyone in XX country looks the same

interesting thread

on a personal note, I'm pretty sure I have my Dad to thank for having developed an outstanding ability to read people ...

he was, let's say, a man of few words - very contemplative and introverted - almost always quiet and placid, and happiest if he could get things done without resorting to words - he had very clear ideas about what he wanted though, and could get very angry if I misread his mind.

as a result I'm even able to read Japanese and Chinese nonverbal signals and nail them accurately.  

... so my own feeling is a) there must be a lot of commonality in gestures in different cultures - it goes without saying it's much more international than language - and b) at the same time a lot of the ability to read and reproduce gestures must be learned.

"Asians seem especially inept at picking up on sarcasm or irony... "

Wish it was that simple as I have managed to offend all Canadians and Americans (every ethnic group) who are from the west coast of North America.  So many people from those places dislike me because they think I had insulted them.  No loss to me as a person is no fun if one cannot laugh at oneself.  

I think they are quite weak in reading body language and paying careful attention to the tone of my jokes and sarcasm.