Can you fake a smile? Can you smile properly? Are you able to use it efficiently? Smiling is a non-verbal communication that often speaks louder than any word. Many people understand that a powerful means of communication can be transmitted through speech and writing. Magazines, televisions, radio, the internet and cell phones are essential tools used to send such communications. Nevertheless, the smile is one of the sturdiest communication tools, and many people spent most of their lives not knowing how to use it properly. Are you such a person? Are you missing out on sharing a smile with friends and family leading to friction in your relationships?
Rationale
Smiling is an essential communication technique. It is a symbol rated with the most positive emotional content. For me, I had been reluctant before accepting smiling. Only a year ago, when one of my relatives told me: ‘Why don't you smile more? To learn how to do it.' I started researching and understood the power of smiling. These days, when a person smiles at me while exchanging a greeting, it makes my day as I also reply with a smile. The Chinese have a saying, ‘A man without a smiling face must not open a shop.' This shows how important it is in business and leadership to learn how to smile since it communicates openness and friendliness making a person more attractive. People tend to hang around such a person, becoming more eager to listen and engage with them. A study at the University of Michigan showed that people who smile more tend to teach, manage and sell better. From experimenting with the communication technique, I hope to find out how smiling has brought people closer to enhancing their relationship. Also, how in the job market, how people use the technique to improve sales and improve the image of the organization.
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Research
A smile originates from the sensory corridors. Emotional data is transported to the brain where it is interpreted and the expression shown of the face. The Duchenne smile is the indicator of real enjoyment. For many years, psychologists agreed that smiles relay various emotions rather than the universal expression of happiness. However, in the 1970s, Wallace Friesen, a psychologist from the University of California seized the precise muscular coordination behind 3000 facial expressions (Eric, 2010). The research helped understand the unique link between positive emotion and the Duchenne smile. From their experiments, it was evident that the Duchenne smiles produced high brain activity on the left anterior, a region connected to positive effects.
A team of psychologists concluded from the findings of a combination of 138 studies that smiling makes people happier and facial expression has a little impact on people's feelings (Coles and Larsen, 2019). Cole and his team used meta-analysis to understand how the body and mind interact to shape people's conscious experience of emotion.
Description of Experiments
To experiment with the technique, I considered three different contexts, work setting, school setting, and family situation. I phoned the customer care service of a particular company two times and analysed how the person communicated to me. The first time, the person on the other side of the call used a hostile tone and thus made it difficult to explain my problem. However, the second time, a friendly person was at the end of the call, and it was evident they spoke with a smile on their face. He asked the challenge I was facing, and I couldn't help but smile as I answered. The conversation flowed, and I was satisfied with the services.
In school, while viewing different students and their social encounters it was evident that those who were jovial and smiled more had more friends compared to the gloomy students who mostly kept to themselves. In a family situation, every time a person smiled at another, the person felt appreciated in building their relationship. When I asked the parties involved in the experiment on their feedback, they all agreed that a smile makes a person more welcoming and friendly making it easier to communicate with them. There were no secondary outcomes during the experiment.
From the experiment, it is evident that smiling is a secure communication skill. A lot can be explained from the facial expression of a person. Even without face to face interaction, as in the case of a phone call, a person can tell the facial expression of the other just from the tone. It is easier to interact with a person with a smiling face than a gloomy one leading to better leadership and business. People should learn to smile more since a smile can trick the brain to creating happiness in the life of a person.
References
Coles, N and Larsen, J. (2019). A meta-analysis of the facial feedback literature: Effects of facial feedback on emotional experience are small and variable. Psychological Bulletin. Knoxville: University of Tennessee.
Eric, J. (2010). The Psychological Study of Smiling. San Francisco: University of California
