So I think a decent number of people here know who Paul Ekman is and what kind of work he's done.

For those of you that don't, hes the guy that discovered microexpressions and is also the consultant for Lie to Me. He is also known for proving that facial expressions are universal throughout the world. His theory has been widely accepted and even Navarro talks about him and his work in his book.

Well, a recent study has suggested that Paul Ekman may be wrong and that facial expressions are not indeed universal.

Here is an article from the British Psychological Society regarding the study:

Facial emotional expressions are not universal

From the Bushmen of the Kalahari to the Kalaallit of Greenland, you'll find that people everywhere frown in frustration and smile in delight. Or will you? The universality of human emotions and their expression in the face has become widely accepted in psychology. At the vanguard of this perspective is pioneering psychologist Paul Ekman, the co-creator of the facial action coding system (FACS) - a way of categorising and interpreting facial expressions according to which muscles are tensed. But a new study casts doubt on the idea that facial expressions are culturally universal, showing instead that people from East Asia have trouble distinguishing fear and disgust from surprise and anger, respectively, as conveyed through faces conforming to the FACS system of expression.

Rachael Jack and colleagues asked 13 Western Caucasian participants and 13 East Asian participants to look at photographs of dozens of White and Chinese faces, and to categorise them into the six core emotional expressions of happy, surprise, fear, disgust, anger and sadness, as determined by the FACS system.

The first key finding was that East Asian participants made significantly more errors when categorising disgust and fear compared with the Western participants. Records of the participants' eye movements also showed differences between the groups. The East Asians tended to focus more exclusively on the eye regions of the faces, whereas the Westerners focused on the nose and mouth region just as much as the eyes. A computer model similarly confused fear and surprise for anger and disgust, respectively, when it was programmed to disproportionately sample from the eye and eye brow region.

In other words, in faces categorised according to Ekman's FACS system, observers need to look at the nose and mouth regions to accurately distinguish between fear, surprise, anger and disgust, but the East Asian participants focused on the eyes, thus leading them to make errors. When in doubt, the East Asian participants tended to bias their answers towards the less threatening emotions such as surprise.

The findings suggest that certain emotions are expressed slightly differently in East Asia, such that people from that culture have learned to focus on different facial regions.

"From here on, examining how the different facets of cultural ideologies and concepts have diversified these basic skills [of communication by facial expression] will elevate knowledge of human emotion processing from a reductionist to a more authentic representation," the researchers said. "Otherwise when it comes to communicating emotions across cultures, Easterners and Westerners will continue to find themselves lost in translation."

http://bps-research-digest.blogspot....s-are-not.html



What do you guys think? If this study is true, wouldn't that mean some of the stuff that Navarro says is not true either (since some of his lessons are based off of Ekman's research)?

I haven't read Ekman in a while, but doesn't he address some of this in his books?
In particular with discussions about some of the culture specific expressions and also how some cultures shift how they answer a question...

I thought Ekman's theory was that all facial expressions are universal for each of the basic 7 emotions?

Anyways, I did some more digging to see if there were other researchers/psychologists who have commented on this study and I came across this blog.

http://www.humintell.com/2009/09/fac...and-its-flaws/

This blogger (who also seems to have a PhD in psychology himself?) basically bashes on the study and says that the researchers came to a wrong conclusion based on their study. It's an interesting and thorough response to the study. I guess Ekman and Navarro's theory still stands.

Ekman's theory is that there are 7 universal emotions.
But the theory leaves room for additional emotions within a culture.

Just scanned the 2nd link you gave. Looks like the new study confused this with the univeral 7 and mistook different cultural recognition rates to mean difference, while ignoring the overal recognition rate vs a base line.

Ekman's work focused on the universality of the physical manifestations of emotion on human faces. Ekman concluded that there was not a cultural bias involved in the way people express emotions.

The article above talks about the way two cultures may interpret emotions.

That's two different discussions.

For what its worth it should be mentioned that Ekman is deeply interested in the way Buddhist meditative practices may able to help people to recognize and manage emotional events. He co-authored a book with the Dalai Lama on the subject. He's shown himself to be very interested and willing to explore the cultural shadings of his work. He even credited time he spent in conversations with the Dalai Lama as inspiring a rewriting of some of the material found in Emotions Revealed.

To bring it back to poker, much of what one will see in the Ekman/Dalai Lama book: http://www.amazon.com/Emotional-Awar.../dp/0805087125 is very similar in theme to Tommy Angelo's writings.

For those who have read Ekman looking for an edge in picking up tells, his work has the reader turn the spotlight back on themselves and reflect on their own mental state.

jfk - You're right. and I think the second link states that as well.

I guess the title of the first article was misleading as it says 'Facial emotional expressions are not universal'. So whoever wrote the first article is at fault here :P

So I wonder then what the conclusion is that researchers came up with for this study. I wonder if they are really defying Ekman's theory or the article made it seem like that...

Also, I've picked up and skimmed through the Ekman/Dalai Lama book. For me, it was a little dry and didn't see how it could benefit us poker players.

racist ban!

blind babies smile when happy. pinch them and they frown. that's persuasive to me.

Hey felson is that true? Do you know from experience or did u read it somewhere? Just curious to know.

yes, it's true; i read it in some evolutionary psych book. google "blind babies smile" and you'll see references to it.

edit: their smiles take longer to develop than sighted babies, so the story is more complex than i had thought.

Hmm... interesting. I tried googling that but I couldn't get much on it. But I stumbled across this study too.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...1229080859.htm

Its a study that says that congenitally blind people smile when they are happy so it is proof that facial expressions are universal. (How could they have learned to smile or frown since they cannot see?)

Its interesting and convincing. Kinda makes me wish I studied psychology in college.

But to answer the question on the title, I'm convinced right now that Paul Ekman is not wrong.

As micro-expressions relate to poker.

I've found that 'reads' of this sort are wayyy over rated. But that is just me.

Hmm... I tend to disagree. I think with proper microexpression training, it can be a very strong asset to your hand reading ability. On another thought though, I personally think that Caro's and Navarro's poker books are overrated and 90% of it really doesn't apply to the game, unless maybe if you're playing with some beginner poker players.

Readers should bear in mind that Caro's book was written when draw was the mainstay of the games in which he played. There's a certain paucity of information in draw which lends itself to reading players more intently. Different skills are more of a premium in games like hold 'em.

It depends on a player's presupposition towards the value of tells. Reading tells is just one more bit of information to help weight a decision.

In a generation before million hand databases, software aides, well written books, training videos and deeply experienced players, a lot of lore built up around the particulars of poker. Included in this lore was the reading of tells and notion that talented players were imbued with preternatural abilities to read an opponents soul.

We now know this to be more mythological and most regard tell reading or eliciting information as tangential to success.

That being said, the works of Caro, Ekman or whomever a read seeks do keep a player more intensely engaged in a game and he/she will generally player better when so engaged. This will not only elicit the occasional accurate read on an opponent, but also lead to fundamentally better play through an active thinking process at the table.

It is very easy for the mind to drift during live play, especially for those used to the speed and pace of heavy online multitabling. The search for tells is one of the best devices by which such a player can keep his mind more actively in the game.

I can agree with a lot of this. I originally wrote out a long response then just shortened it.

Basically, for most of us, myself included, I am not at the level where I can properly utilize tells. Or to put another way, the other fundamental and intermediate aspects of play are where I make my bread and butter. Thus far, i'm not playing at a table of poker jedi masters whose play is flawless and thus my only 'edge' is my ability to read micro-tells.

Truth be told, the VAST majority of mistakes at the table are going to be mistakes in poker fundamentals: Position, drawing, giving pot odds, lack of agression, being a calling station, being too scared to pull the trigger, being too predictable, etc. etc.

That is what I really meant about micro-tells being overrated.

I know we all think we are jedi-poker masters who are at the top 1%, but truth be told, the vast majority of us are not at the level to effectively use micro-tells. And more to the point, our opponents are not at the level in which micro-tells would be the principle means by which we beat them.

But in regards to these tells helping us pay attention. Sure, anything that helps players pay attention is a good thing.

Since I'm primarily a live player, I have no problems with my focus. You internet guys on the other hand, LOL, are hilarious at the table. You turn into action junkies sometimes just because things are going to slow for you.

Hey JFK.

Great post. Ya, I totally agree that reading body language/facial expression should be/is used as another set of skills on top of whatever other skills you may have in handreading.

I don't think anyone should be basing their decision only by reading microexpressions, although that may be the only read you got on them.

my .02 about tells;
the problem i see with tells is a lot of players do not know where their hand acutally sits; a draw vs a made hand and the strength of that draw or made hand.
therefore some guy acts like he has a monster and has a decent draw, his tells will be that of a monster because that is what he thinks and feels that he has,
i play lots of people who over value their hands and their tells tell what they think of the situation. not what they really have
my.02