The Secret Is in the Smile
A smile means that someone is happy—or maybe not. Although we associate smiling with happiness, people can use a smile to convey a whole range of different messages.
Research in nonverbal communication has discovered some different types of smiles and what they mean.
The Smile of True Happiness
Psychologist Paul Ekman, an expert in nonverbal communication has identified the smile that is most commonly associated with true happiness. He calls it the Duchenne smile (named after a 19th-century neurologist). The Duchenne smile has the upward corners of the mouth that identify a “smile,” but the telling cue is the narrowed eyes that leave wrinkles, or “crow’s feet,” at the outer corners of the eyes.
The Duchenne smile is in contrast to the fake smile when someone is trying to fake happiness. When the photographer tells us to “say ‘cheese’ and smile for the camera” odds are that we are engaging in a fake smile. But, if the photographer suddenly holds a rubber chicken over his head, some of us might break into a true, Duchenne smile!
The Seductive Smile
My research, with nonverbal communication expert Howard Friedman, asked participants to appear seductive on video. What we found was that when people are effective at displaying seduction (success is when others view and agree that the participant is being seductive) their faces display positive affect. For example, a slight smile that accompanies direct eye contact, with a slow glance away, but still holding the smile.
The Uncomfortable Smile
Imagine that someone says something to you that is wholly inappropriate—a sexual innuendo, making you the butt of a joke. The reaction of many people is to display a smile to cover up the shock that they are feeling.
This is what happened in one ingenious experiment. Women in a job interview were asked an inappropriate sexual question, and many of them displayed the uncomfortable smile—a very low-intensity smile that lacked the nonverbal eye cues associated with the Duchenne smile.
The Sarcastic Smile
It is nearly impossible to display sarcasm through body language cues alone. Sarcasm usually involves saying one thing verbally, while your nonverbal cues are in direct contrast—giving away the sarcasm.
For example, you might say to a friend “I don’t like you!” but your smile contradicts the words. Or, turn it around. Someone says something absurd, and you reply “I didn’t know you were so smart,” accompanied by a smile and an eye roll. When someone is giving a sarcastic smile, the eyes will usually give it away.
In addition, a sarcastic smile can look crooked, showing the conflicting emotions of amusement and dislike.
People smile all the time—many times per day. Yet, those smiles can mean many things besides happiness and amusement. The key to successfully decoding all those smiling faces is to look carefully at the entire array of body language cues.