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> Examples - Emotion
> Jaimee's Example
Jaimee Bachelder Psychology 110 Dr. Thomas Link (10-10:50am)
Status Report
Hypothesis My hypothesis is that women are more able to display recognizable emotion through facial expression than men are. In addition, women can identify emotions through facial expressions better than a man can. Background Emotions are usually displayed through a person's facial expressions. This is because certain facial expressions of primary emotions are fundamental to human nature. Emotions are sometimes misread, but that can be because there are primary emotions in which other emotions stem from. These primary emotions are also referred to as universal emotions, which are widely recognized. These emotions are joy, surprise, disgust, anger, fear, shame, and sadness. Other emotions can come from in these basic emotions. For example, disappointment is a combination of sadness and surprise, and delight is a combination of joy and surprise (Plutchik 1980). I know that when I first started looking deeper into this subject, I began to pay more attention to what my facial expressions were when I was feeling certain things. If I were sad, my face would feel droopy and heavy, when I was happy, my face would feel lifted and tight. Even when talking to people you find yourself trying to communicate with your facial expressions to show maybe how mad you were when stating a certain thing, or even how happy you feel at that moment. Researching and reading deeper into this subject has also helped to look deeper into other peopleÕs faces around me whether itÕs my friends, family, or just people walking through the hall and by observing them I really seem to be able to have some idea of the mood they are in or what they are feeling. Recognizing emotions can also be linked to being able to express these emotions. A person can be feeling sad but not necessarily show it on their face to be recognizable, which runs into display rules. Display rules are the way people express their emotion according to social guidelines. For example, in the United States a boy who cries is seen as wimp and usually made fun of. Therefore, in public, boys and men in the United States usually refrain from crying or showing strong emotions in public. Women usually display their emotion freely. This is because women are encouraged more to express how they feel and when. I know that when my grandfather died, which was my fatherÕs father, my whole family felt grief. It was easier for me, my sister and my mother to be open with our feelings and to cry openly and to even say how saddened we were. However, for my father and my brother, they seemed to slink back, display a sad face, and maybe let a tear or two go, but seemed to hold back their true feelings of grief when it was obvious of their sadness. Expressing emotion ties in with being able to communicate, particularly, nonverbal communication. Women rely more on nonverbal communication to express themselves. Women, commonly using more nonverbal expression than men, are believed to be able to express emotion better. Men are more apparent about a certain emotion than women are, and that is anger. That may be because women are somewhat seen as a powerless group, and lower in social standing which may not give them the self confidence to be able to communicate such a strong emotion. Women also pay more attention to nonverbal signs, such as facial expressions and body movement. This in turn gives them the ability to show support and sensitivity. Hence the saying towards men, ÒYou insensitive pig!Ó Because of a womenÕs social standing, women can sometimes see adjusting their behavior to accommodate a manÕs rewarding. Therefore, a woman who can read her man will in turn have a better relationship with him overall because a man does not express his emotions. For my own personal experience, I have been with the same guy for about two and a half years and I rely on my ability to be able to read his emotions through his facial expressions and his body language in order for us to communicate our problems with each other. If he is ever mad, he will not state that, he will wait until I have noticed his madness myself through his actions. He waits for me to read him; he does not communicate his emotions with me. In addition, his facial expressions are not always clear. Much of the time I have to talk to him and find out through that what he is feeling. When I am mad or angry, he will be sorry towards me, or comforting to me, but he will never try to communicate why I am mad or what exactly he has done. He has told me though he knows when I am mad; I just have to give him the Òlook.Ó If I am ever sad, I will make it apparent in my body language and the way I speak to him. Through this relationship, I have learned the importance of being able to see other peopleÕs emotions other ways than verbally and have learned that body language is a very important way to communicate. Through these factors, I believe my hypothesis is true. Men are not so easy to show emotion, and women are more than willing to read ones emotion. Because women rely more on nonverbal communication, and tend to attempt more than men to read body language in order to convey sensitivity and supportiveness, I believe they will be portray emotions through facial expression and to read facial expressions better than men. 1st Variable Which gender is able to read facial expressions better than the other is. —I will measure this by seeing who identifies more emotions correctly. 2nd Variable Which gender is able to better display emotions through facial expressions. —I will measure this by the number of correctly identified pictures of the man and woman expressing emotion. Procedure I first took seven pictures of a man and a woman, separately, having the facial expressions of surprise, anger, disgust, amazement, doubt, happiness, and delight. During these sessions of taking the photographs, I found that the woman more easily could think of the emotion and portray it quicker than the man could. The man for almost every emotion I told him to express had to stop and think about it, and even then hesitated in expressing the emotion. After taking the pictures, I made a list of the emotions, plus three distracting emotions. The distracting emotions I picked were somewhat similar to some of those that were portrayed in the pictures, but not so similar that they could be very easily confused. I asked three men and three women to identify the pictures with the correct emotions. All of the pictures were shown at once, and all the choices of emotions were shown at once. I made this choice because I thought that by doing this it would be easier to use the process of elimination and they would not rush themselves because they were being timed. Once each person was allowed access to the pictures and the choices of emotions, which were laid out on a surface, I timed each person how long it took them to match the emotion to the picture. Timing each person, I believe, would support my hypothesis on which gender could more easily recognize each emotion. It also showed which gender was more familiar with having to read facial expressions to find emotions. Doing this, I found that the women had a faster averaged time than the men did. This proves that women are able to more quickly identify emotions then men are able to. Identifying the emotions, women had a higher average in correct answers than the men did, which also helps to support my hypothesis. Overall, though it was very close, the emotions of the picture of the woman were guessed more right then the pictures of the man. Proceed Next I plan to go much deeper into this research and alter some of my procedures. I plan to take more pictures of different men and women and compare their reactions to which emotions they are asked to portray, how long it takes them to feel confident they are portraying the emotion correctly, and how similar they are to other pictures taken of their own gender. In addition, when asking people to identify the pictures to their emotions, I may try showing them each picture separately and picking from a list of emotions a match. This way they will not be able to use the process of elimination and will not be timed. Also, when deciding on people to identify the pictures, I may decide to group them together by age or by experience as far as relationships, but I am not quite sure on how I would measure that. Overall, I am very pleased with my preliminary research in that it supports my hypothesis. I believe, however, that I can add other factors to this project to make it more interesting, such as using more people to make my results stronger. Even using more people, I am confident that it will only make my hypothesis stronger. This I believe, from my own personal experience, as a woman, and in talking with other people.
Questions Are showing all the pictures at once and all the emotions at once manipulating the results? Would the results be more promising if I were to show the pictures one at a time and have them match it with the given list of emotions? Would grouping the observers by age, by experience in relationships have any affect on the results, or just be one extra step? Would taking more pictures of men and women make my hypothesis stronger? Asking more people to observe? Is observing when I was taking the photographs, the hesitation or the time it took for each gender to think of and portray the emotion relevant to what IÕm trying to prove, or does that have to do with their personality and whether or not they are shy? Is timing how long it takes each gender to match the picture with the emotion manipulating the results because they may feel rushed? Should I time them secretly?
Woman Observer ResultsNumber of pictures of the woman identified correctly: 15 Incorrectly: 6 Number of pictures of the man identified correctly: 9 Incorrectly: 12 Man ObserverNumber of pictures of the woman identified correctly: 14 Incorrectly: 7 Number of pictures of the man identified correctly: 10 Incorrectly: 11 TotalsNumber of pictures of the woman identified correctly: 29 Incorrectly: 13 Number of pictures of the man identified correctly: 19 Incorrectly: 23 (R=Right, W=Wrong)
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