Read My Face, But You Better Be Quick

A century's worth of research has said that facial expressions for basic human emotions are universal. No matter what culture you grow up in, an angry face is an angry face.

Now, some 2009 research by David Matsumoto, published in Psychological Science, suggests that universal facial expressions may actually "arm wrestle" with cultural display rules.

Cultural display rules are the "rules" for what are "appropriate" ways to show your emotions in your culture. In the middle east, you tear your clothes and throw dust in the air to show your grief. In the far east, you remain stoic and quiet.

Matsumoto's findings show that "facial emotional expressions start out universal, but then become culturally differentiated." His team studied thousands of photographs taken of jūdōka at the Athens Olympics in 2004 just after matches had ended. They looked at the immediate facial expressions and how quickly (if at all) the athletes changed their expressions.

The key finding was that athletes from collectivist cultures, such as China, tended to mask their emotional expressions more than athletes from individualistic cultures like America.

"These findings demonstrate that, across time, a given individual's emotional expressions in a single context can be both universal and culture-specific," the researchers said.

POP QUIZ: How quickly did the cultural display rules kick in after the initial facial expression?
ANSWER: Less than 2 seconds.

Nature and Nurture are judoing. The brain (nature) responds first, then culture(nurture) kicks in. Matsumoto and his colleagues believe that "the initial facial reaction is triggered automatically by subcortical brain structures, before more culturally specific modification is applied by the motor cortex."

Words you learned from this post: "jūdōka" (one who participates in Judo), "judoing" (what one is doing when she is competing in Judo).

The Grady Life Adapatability Satisfaction Scale (GLASS)

My psychology students have been helping me develop an "Adaptability" inventory this semester. They took it and gave it to over 400 people. Thanks, guys!

It is called The Grady Life Adaptablity Satisfaction Scale (GLASS), and it is now available on my web site - Grady Psyc Stuff. You can get to my web site by clicking the link in the upper right corner of my blog.

The inventory is based on the characteristics of Carl Rogers' "Fully Functioning" people, and William Menninger's "Emotionally Mature" people. Discussion of those terms is found in their writings.

I have chosen to refer to individuals who possess 12 characteristics as "Adapatable." My inventory lets you determine how satisfied you are with your level of adapatability in life, and to compare yourself with others. Are you more, or less, adaptable and satisified than most people?

You can take and score the inventory in less than 5 minutes. Everything you need is on my web site.

Want to know what someone else thinks about you? There is a second version of it that you can have them take on you, to compare your self-view with their view of you.

For the statisticians among you - norms, validity, and reliability information can be found with the inventory. It has a positive correlation co-efficient with Richard Ryan's Basic Needs Satisfaction in General inventory that measures Autonomy, Competence, and Relatedness.

Of Joggers and Cockroaches

First, the cockroaches.

Did you know that cockroaches walk faster if other cockroaches are present? If they are learning an easy maze, they learn it more quickly if other cockroaches are present. But, if they trying to learn a difficult maze, the presence of other cockroaches slows them down.

One psychologist (jokingly, I think) suggested that it was the presence of cute cockroaches that slowed them down. I don't know how you would measure cockroach attractiveness. But that does lead to...

The joggers. Human joggers, that is.

Researchers had an attractive female sunbathe next to a jogging path, positioned so that she was looking at the joggers as they went by. Yep, males sped up as they jogged past her. When the researchers positioned her so that the joggers could see her but she could not see them, they did not speed up.

It was serious research, really. They were studying the question: is it the mere presence of someone that affects our behavior or is it "Evaluation Apprehension"? The answer is that it is the threat of evaluation that affects our behavior.

Making Free Throws

One of my students plays for Connors' women's basketball team and last week she got me thinking about Social Facilitation and Social Inhibition.

In 1898 Norman Triplett did the first experiment on the influence of people on performance. He found that people wound string on his "winding machine" more quickly if they were part of a group of people than if they were alone.

His conclusion? "That's interesting."

Fast forward...

Over a century of research has revealed that sometimes being in a group makes you perform better, but sometimes it makes you perform worse. The term for the first is Social Facilitation, the second is Social Inhibition.

The question has been, when does being in a group help and when does it hurt?

The answer is: it depends. "Dr G, that doesn't appear to be an answer." Ah, but it is.

If the behavior is something that is difficult, but you are good at it, a group makes you perform better. If the behavior is difficult, and you are not good at it, a group makes you perform worse than when you are alone.

This is called the "dominant response." Groups enhance your dominant response.

Crowds help professional basketball players. They hurt amateurs. The dominant response of a professional is to make free throws. The dominant response of an amateur is to miss a lot of them.

A Lebron James has the chance to make a free throw to win the NBA championship. 18,000 fans are screaming. His odds of making it are higher than if he were by himself in the gym.

You win a drawing and have a chance to hit a free throw at half-time for $10,000. You have a week to practice it. You do great during practice! Then it comes to making the free throw at half-time, with throngs of people around, cheering for you. Will your odds of making it increase or decrease?

Decrease. Making free throws is not your dominant response. You can make them when not in a crowd. A crowd will cause you to perform worse.

This brings me to my student/athlete. A couple of weeks ago she asked me if I would sponsor her in a fund raiser for the team - $1 for each free throw she would make out of 100 attempts. She made 73 of them. For those of you who aren't very good in multiplication, that meant I owed her $73. I told her, "You better shoot 73% during the season", and I gave coach the check.

How does this apply?

When she shot 73% there were no fans around. When she shoots free throws during the season, will there be? Nod your head yes. That will make a difference. Will she do better or worse than 73% during the season?

It depends. "There is that non-answer again, Dr. G."

It depends. Is making free throws her "dominant response?" If it is, she will do better in the crowd of fans. If it isn't, she will do worse.

I told her, "I'm going to keep your free throw statistics during the season."

I'll let you know how she does.