Smiling
"Psychologists have found that even if you’re in bad mood, you can instantly lift your spirits by forcing yourself to smile." Numerous amounts of research studies have shown that making a facial expression, such as smiling, can produce effects on the body that are similar to those that result from the actual emotion, such as happiness. Paul Ekman and his colleagues have studied facial expressions of emotions and have linked specific emotions to the movement of specific facial muscles. Each basic emotion is associated with a distinctive facial expression. Sensory feedback from the expression contributes to the emotional feeling. Example: Smiling if you want to feel happy. Facial expressions have a large effect on self-reported anger and happiness which then affects your mood. Ekman has found that these expressions of emotion are universal and recognizable across widely divergent cultures.
Read more about this topic: Mood (psychology)
Famous quotes containing the word smiling:
“I have given suck, and know
How tender ‘tis to love the babe that milks me;
I would, while it was smiling in my face,
Have plucked my nipple from his boneless gums
And dashed the brains out, had I so sworn
As you have done to this.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“When the weather suits you not,
Try smiling;
When your coffee isn’t hot,
Try smiling;”
—Unknown. Try Smiling (l. 1–4)
“Some people swallow the universe like a pill; they travel on through the world, like smiling images pushed from behind.”
—Robert Louis Stevenson (1850–1894)