Every person across all culture’s express emotions. People express emotions verbally or non-verbally. Research has been conducted to determine whether emotions look the same across all cultures. Body language and gestures have been proven to have different meanings but what about facial expression?
I think facial expressions are the same globally. Research by Dr. Paul Ekman, a Psychologist, argued that the expression of emotions through facial expressions was universal around the world. He found that people can make thousands of facial expressions all falling under six categories; happiness, sadness, anger, disgust, and fear. Ekman believed that not only are these emotions inborn but also wired in the brain. (Dobrin, 2013).
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Perception of emotion around the world.
Various research suggests that different cultures have their way of experiencing, expressing, and interpreting emotions. This could lead one to misinterpret the meaning of similar emotions expressed by other cultures. To have a good conversation or relation, one must correctly interpret the other person’s emotions.
Studies Biasness.
Yes, I think the studies were biased. This is because these studies were conducted by Americans who put pictures associated with how they displayed their emotions giving the American participants an advantage over the rest and making the results not accurate nor reliable.
Making the studies more reliable
I would make the studies less biased by ensuring that each participant had a picture representing how they showed their emotions. The answers to how different people interpret emotions from other cultures would be more accurate.
Importance of understanding the role of culture in emotional expression
I agree Culture plays a huge factor in how people express emotions (Pogosyan,2018); Different cultures have rules on how and what emotions should be expressed. (Malatesta & Haviland, 1982). Some cultures like Japan, negative emotions such as fear, anger should be displayed in secrecy. Therefore, seeing someone from the US expressing such emotions publicly, may seem quite rude.
It is very important to understand how one culture differentiates from your culture in expressing and interpreting emotions to avoid misinterpretations which may be viewed as rude or ignorant.
References
Dobrin, A (2013). Facial Expressions: Universal vs Cultural. Psychology Today. Retrieved from :
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/am-i-right/201306/facial-expressions-universal-vs-cultural?amp
Malatesta, C(1982). Learning display rules: The socialization of emotion expression in infancy. Retrieved from:
https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1983-10241-001
Pogosyan, M (2018). How Cultures shape emotions. Psychology Today. Retrieved from :
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/between-cultures/201803/how-culture-shapes-emotions?amp
