The Business Benifits of Getting Angry. More money, more status, more promotions and power. Hitler used anger.

In preparation of the Hitler Documentary I am watching him be very angry in his speeches. Hitler used anger to gain power and status with his audience as well as to sway them to their primitive emotions.  Here is an article I wrote on the benefits of anger.

Getting angry can get you promoted.

Yes, surprisingly new research studies suggests that we perceive people who get angry as having more competence and leadership capability than people who are warm and nice If your one of those “nice” people you might be rather disappointed to learn that niceness is not always rewarded. If you get mad easily you may want to show this article to your boss right away! I am going to share the research and then make recommendations for the nice folks on this newsletter list.

I teach interpersonal skills. I know that I have always valued kindness in others, feel blessed to have a group of wonderfully kind friends, and see myself as a caring soul but recent events in my life have reminded me that being nice does not always pay. So I have been reading research on niceness and even a book about being a people pleaser. Are you surprised? I know I am professional speaker and I confident in so much of my life, but at my core my Myers Brigs Personality type reads “loves to be of service to others.” I just want to make sure that for all you other nice people out that your personality type never reads “are a doormat.” And sometimes reads “You need to serve me.”

In one of a series of research studies on anger by Standform researchers Larrissa Tiedens, Tieden  tested  24 employees at a Palo Alto software company. Each worker received a list of coworkers and a list of emotions. They had to rate how often their colleagues expressed anger. At the same time, the group manager filled out a questionnaire indicating how likely he would be to promote each of the employees. The degree to which people were rated by coworkers as expressing a lot of anger predicted the degree to which the manager said he would promote them—that is, the more angry, the more likely to be promoted. Oh my gosh! Start yelling right now! While you are at it stomp your foot a few times.

In another study, Tiedens had MBA students watch a video clip of a job interview. The applicant was asked to describe a negative event, such as an office presentation that went wrong. In one case, the applicant exuded anger about the event. In another tape, the applicant said he felt guilty and sad that people had been let down. The MBA students were asked if they would hire the applicant they had just seen. They were equally willing to hire both applicants, but they slotted the one who displayed anger for a higher-level, higher-paying job than the applicant who showed sadness. This is bizarre news to a professional speaker. If you want to increase your income have a bad speech, then get mad about it and stay mad all the way to the bank.

Not only did Tiedons research subjects say that angry people are more highly competent they said those expressing sadness or guilt were viewed as likable and warm, though not chosen for leadership. Why? Tiedens belives her subjects.”Are making the decisions about who will get status based not on socio-emotional characteristics such as warmth and likeability, but on competence characteristics," Anger is powerful. Anger gets its way. If you have red or been through  my DISC personality training you remember the Driver or Get it Done type doesn’t care about people only the task. The corporate world rewards results. And if Get it Dones' will yell and scream get to get things done as soon as possible. Anger gets its way fast.  It is a time saver. Being nice takes too much time! In the corporate time is money.

Think about what nice people do. They stew about it. They think inside their heads of the perfect way they will say it. They call or email their friends to discuss it. That not only takes time it does not deal directly with the person. Here is an insight for nice people those actions do not produce results.

My advice all you nice folks out there…no it’s not to get mad. It is to communicate. Use your verbal and your nonverbal communication to the person who can full fill your request. Be powerful and be fast. Quickly figure right now think of something you want. Whether it is a project from your boss, an assignment from a co-worker, more money, or a call from your sweetie now go to that person and ask for it. You can use a nice warm voice, but if that doesn’t work it is important stand strong use a slightly louder firmer voice and say it again. Use the phrase “This is important.” If it still doesn’t work insist on it. Use the phrase, “This needs to happen.” Or “This needs to happen immediately.” You nice people will think this is too radical, everybody else however thinks that this is standard operating procedure.

My life has been rich because of kindness. However I know and I want you to know that there are times when you need to take strong action. Yes, you catch more flies with honey and that true, but sometimes you get tired of flies and you want the darn honey yourself. So ask for it. And over the next week wither you have the nice guy or an angry competent person notice the people around you and how they get their way.

 I will be blogging more about vice of nice so let me know what you think.

Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com. Also check out Patti's YouTube channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Where Do We Feel Different Emotions in the Body? Love Make Us Warm All Over.

I am fascinated by the gestures of great speakers. I am studying Hitler's Body Language for  Discovery Channel Documentary Series. Hitler practiced specific gestures to make when he was giving speeches and many of them are expansive and weapon like gestures to make him appear large powerful and omnipotent and dangerous. In several of his practiced gestures in the famous posed Hoffman Photos one hand is at the head level or above it. Hitler used anger in most of his speeches and its interesting that anger actives the upper body, that is the head, shoulders upper chest and hands and arms.
Here is an interesting study about what part of the body is activated when we feel different emotions. The findings where self reported, so more research needs to be done. But I find it fascinating that we think we feel different emotions in different parts of are body.

http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2013/12/30/258313116/mapping-emotions-on-the-body-love-makes-us-warm-all-over

Mapping Emotions On The Body: Love Makes Us Warm All Over

Updated January 6, 20148:08 AM ETPublished December 30, 20134:04 PM ET

MICHAELEEN DOUCLEFF

Twitter

People drew maps of body locations where they feel basic emotions (top row) and more complex ones (bottom row). Hot colors show regions that people say are stimulated during the emotion. Cool colors indicate deactivated areas.

Image courtesy of Lauri Nummenmaa, Enrico Glerean, Riitta Hari, and Jari Hietanen.

Close your eyes and imagine the last time you fell in love. Maybe you were walking next to your sweetheart in a park or staring into each other's eyes over a latte.

Where did you feel the love? Perhaps you got butterflies in your stomach or your heart raced with excitement.

When a team of scientists in Finland asked people to map out where they felt different emotions on their bodies, they found that the results were surprisingly consistent, even across cultures.

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People reported that happiness and love sparked activity across nearly the entire body, while depression had the opposite effect: It dampened feelings in the arms, legs and head. Danger and fear triggered strong sensations in the chest area, the volunteers said. And anger was one of the few emotions that activated the arms.

The scientists hope these body emoticons may one day help psychologists diagnose or treat mood disorders.

"Our emotional system in the brain sends signals to the body so we can deal with our situation," says Lauri Nummenmaa, a psychologist at Aalto University who led the study.

"Say you see a snake and you feel fear," Nummenmaa says. "Your nervous system increases oxygen to your muscles and raises your heart rate so you can deal with the threat. It's an automated system. We don't have to think about it."

That idea has been known for centuries. But scientists still don't agree on whether these bodily changes are distinct for each emotion and whether this pattern serves as a way for the mind to consciously identify emotions.

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Basic emotions, such as happiness, sadness and fear, form the building blocks for more complex feelings.

Toddatkins/Wikimedia.org

To try to figure that out, Nummenmaa and his team ran a simple computer experiment with about 700 volunteers from Finland, Sweden and Taiwan.

The team showed the volunteers two blank silhouettes of a person on a screen and then told the subjects to think about one of 14 emotions: love, disgust, anger, pride, etc. The volunteers then painted areas of the body that felt stimulated by that emotion. On the second silhouette, they painted areas of the body that get deactivated during that emotion.

"People find the experiment quite amusing. It's quite fun," Nummenmaa tells Shots. "We kept the questions online so you try the experiment yourself." (You can try it here.)

Not everybody painted each emotion in the same way. But when the team averaged the maps together, signature patterns emerged for each emotion. The team published these sensation maps Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The team still doesn't know how these self-reported sensations match with the physiological responses that occur with emotion.

But previous studies have found marked changes in bodily sensations in mood disorders, Nummenmaa says. "For instance, with depression sometimes people have pain in their chest."

And there's even some evidence that when you change your own body language — like your posture or stance — you can alter your mind.

Neuroscientist Antonio Damasio, who was not involved in this study, says he's "delighted" by Nummenmaa's findings because they offer more support for what he's been suggesting for years: Each emotion activates a distinct set of body parts, he thinks, and the mind's recognition of those patterns helps us consciously identify that emotion.

"People look at emotions as something in relation to other people," Damasio, who is a professor at the University of Southern California, says. "But emotions also have to do with how we deal with the environment — threats and opportunities." For those, Damasio says, you need your body as well as your mind.

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Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com. Also check out Patti's YouTube channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Jodi's Tears - Real or Fake?

Jodi Arias' body language during the trial on

Tuesday, March 26, 2013
As expert witness on domestic abuse was on the stand

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzspDZUMnHY&feature=youtu.be

When the witness about domestic violence was asked if she'd been a witness for a man in a domestic violence case, Jodi Arias leaned on her head and did an arm hand block on her neck. She is doing a lot of eyeglass adjustment where she lifts her eyeglasses up and puts them back down as she did last week. This eye glass adjustment is only done when there is something going on that she really does not like seeing. Remember the timing is the tell. Also notice how full her cheeks are and how her lips are pressed indicating she's trying to keep emotions in. Notice the timing of this tell is during the expert witness on domestic abuse discussing isolating the victim. Also for the first time I'm seeing extreme fatigue. (The day following this testimony court is canceled as Jodi has a migraine so I think I was seeing the pain buildup here.)

Jodi did a pretend head rest a lot today where she pretended to rest but did not fully rest head on her upraised fist symbolizing her wish to be fighting.

When the expert witness said, “and sometimes it can be sexual abuse it does not have to be forceful,” Jodi brought her hand as if she was going to brush back her hair and scratched her ear and spent quite a long time scratching around the ear which indicates that the idea that she was sexually abused even this conversation coming up was disturbing to her and she didn't like hearing it again.  First she looked as the word sexual abuse was stated then she brought her right hand and arm across her body to scratch her left ear.

When expert witness said, “abuse can be forceful, sexual abuse can more physically forceful and violent “Jodi did a significant eyeglass adjustment holding her hand to the glasses to partially block our view of her.

This is interesting the expert witness is talking about “insidious sexual abuse” and Jodi Arias is resting her head on her upraised hand and she looks tired and rather bored on one side of her face is showing asymmetry. She has a bizarre vacant unfocused eye and a face that that is like melted wax (what I call a face with no affect or facial tension and the other side of Jodi’s face is totally different.) In fact the other side is angry with a glare at the eyes with the tightening and pulled in around the lips on that side. This means there is conflict between her neocortex and her limbic brain. She feels anger but feels she must dissociate from it.

When expert witness is talking about sexual humiliation and degradation from the abuser, Jodi shows mouth cues of sadness and distaste. Look at her mouth at 3:43 PM again very asymmetrical.  See anger on one side of the face of a real anger and Apsley disconnection on the other.

Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com. Also check out Patti's YouTube channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Why Men Look Angry and Women Look Happy

People are quicker to see anger on men's faces and happiness on women's. Is this research finding  a simple case of gender stereotyping, or something more deeply rooted? When I was conducting research on smiling my clients assumed that women always smiled more than men. Women do smile more than men, when they are in public. We like our women to smile that makes all of us men and women feel safe. There are more interesting insights in the following article by Beth Azar.

By Beth Azar

April 2007, Vol 38, No. 4
Print version: page 18

It might not be surprising that people find it easier to see men as angry and women as happy. Women do tend to be the nurturers and men--well--men do commit 80 to 90 percent of all violent crimes. More surprising, perhaps, is new research suggesting that the connection between men and anger and women and happiness goes deeper than these simple social stereotypes, regardless of how valid they are.

Our brains automatically link anger to men and happiness to women, even without the influence of gender stereotypes, indicate the findings of a series of experiments conducted by cognitive psychologist D. Vaughn Becker, PhD, of Arizona State University at the Polytechnic Campus, with colleagues Douglas T. Kenrick, PhD, Steven L. Neuberg, PhD, K.C. Blackwell and Dylan Smith, PhD. They even turned it around to show that people are more likely to think a face is masculine if it's making an angry expression and feminine if its expression is happy. In fact, their research, published in February's Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (Vol. 92, No. 2, pages 179-190), suggests that the cognitive processes that distinguish male and female may be co-mingled with those that distinguish anger from happiness, thereby leading to this perceptual bias.

Becker proposes that this bias may stem from our evolutionary past, when an angry man would have been one of the most dangerous characters around, and a nurturing, happy female might have been just the person to protect you from harm. Evolutionary psychologist Leda Cosmides, PhD, agrees.

"If it's more costly to make a mistake of not recognizing an angry man, you would expect the [perceptual] threshold to be set lower than for recognizing an angry female," says Cosmides, of the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB).

More than a stereotype

Becker first noticed that people find it easier to detect anger on men and happiness on women a couple years ago while working on his dissertation at Arizona State. He was testing whether viewing an angry or happy expression "primes" people to more quickly identify a subsequent angry or happy expression. Becker confirmed his initial hypothesis, but when he ran an additional analysis to test whether the gender of the person making the facial expression affected his results, he found that gender was, by far, the biggest predictor of how quickly and accurately people identified facial expressions.

Becker couldn't find any mention of this gender effect in the literature. So he set out to confirm that people more quickly link men to anger and women to happiness and figure out why that might be.

In the first of a series of studies, 38 undergraduate participants viewed pictures of faces displaying prototypical angry and happy expressions. They pressed "A" or "H" on a computer keyboard to indicate whether the expression was angry or happy, and the researchers recorded their reaction times. As expected, participants were quicker to label male faces "angry" and female faces "happy."

The researchers then used a version of the "Implicit Association Test" to uncover unconscious biases that study participants may have linking men to anger and women to happiness. The well-documented test allows researchers to examine the strength of connections between categories, which lead to unconscious stereotypes. Becker tested whether study participants unconsciously linked male names with angry words and female names with happy words. Most did.

However, 13 students showed the opposite association (male-happy, female-angry), implying that their unconscious gender stereotypes run counter to those of the general public. It was an ideal opportunity to determine whether gender stereotypes are at the heart of the emotion/gender bias. They weren't: Just like the main group of participants, this subgroup more quickly and accurately categorized male faces as angry and female faces as happy.

"While gender stereotypes clearly influence perception, the implicit association test results made us think the effect is not solely a function of stereotypes," says Becker.

Overlapping signals

Since gender stereotypes don't seem to be the culprit, Becker looked toward more deeply rooted causes.

For example, perhaps we see more men with angry faces--on television, in movies--than we see women with angry faces, so our brains are well practiced at recognizing an angry expression on a man. To investigate this possibility, one of the co-authors, Arizona State University graduate student K.C. Blackwell, suggested they flip the experiment around. Instead of asking people to identify facial expressions while the experimenters manipulated gender, they asked them to identify whether a face was male or female while manipulating facial expressions.

"While you can argue that the majority of angry faces we see are male, it's tough to argue that the majority of male faces we see are angry," says Becker. So, if the relationship between emotional expression and gender is simply a matter of how frequently we see anger on men and happiness on women, the effect should disappear when researchers flip around the question. What they found, on the contrary, was that people were faster to identify angry faces as male and happy faces as female.

To follow-up on this finding, they conducted another study in which they used computer graphics software to control not only the intensity of facial expressions, but also the masculinity and femininity of the facial features, creating faces that were just slightly masculine or feminine. As predicted, people were more likely to see the more masculine faces as angrier, even when they had slightly happier expressions than the more feminine faces.

These findings suggest that the brain begins to associate emotions and gender very early in the cognitive process, says Becker. One possible explanation is that the brain has an "angry male detection module" enabling fast and accurate detection of what would have been one of the most dangerous entities in our evolutionary past. But Becker thinks there's a more parsimonious explanation.

"I'm more inclined to think that we've got a situation where the signals for facial expressions and those for masculinity and femininity have merged over time," he says.

In particular, features of masculinity --such as a heavy brow and angular face--somewhat overlap with the anger expression, and those of femininity--roundness and soft features--overlap with the happiness expression.

To test this hypothesis, Becker and his colleagues used computer animation software to individually manipulate masculine and feminine facial features of expressively neutral faces. As predicted, a heavier brow caused participants to see faces as both more masculine and more angry, implying that the mental processes for determining masculinity and anger may be intertwined.

"These results make a lot of sense," says University of Pittsburgh behavioral anthropologist and facial expression researcher Karen Schmidt, PhD. "Faces have always had gender, so if we're always activating gender and affect at the same time then the processing is likely highly coordinated."

The paper raises new and interesting questions about gender, says UCSB postdoctoral student Aaron Sell, PhD, who studies the evolution of gender. "Specifically," he says, "why do male and female faces differ, and what is the nature of emotion detection?"

The data appear to suggest that the anger expression has evolved to make a face seem more masculine, says Sell. Even female faces may communicate anger more effectively the more masculine they appear, says Becker. Future studies will have to tackle questions about the intentions expressed by the angry face and why looking more male would be an evolutionary advantage in communicating these intentions.

"I see this article as opening the book on a new research topic more than having the final say on the issue," says Sell.

Beth Azar is a writer in Portland, Ore.

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Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at http://PattiWood.net. Also check out the body language quiz on her YouTube Channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Patti Reveals What is Behind Their "Cry Cover" Smiles

This is an expression I call the cry cover smile. Yes, most people who give this expression believe they are covering their true emotions with a smile.
This expression is typically found in men and I think comes from the need to keep a “stiff upper lip.” Many times this expression is an attempt to hide many intense emotions of sadness, fear and anger. I see it in men who typically have very strong egos and power and are caught and brought down. There are several photos of this expression in former Governor Blagojevich.

Congressman Wiener’s expression is a suppressed fear, disgust and anger (If you cover up his mouth and look at just his eyes you will see the whites around his eyes and his sideways glance, and disgust. Notice the wrinkled nose that is a unique movement of the face given in disgust.)
If I knew exactly when he gave that expression I could tell you whether he was disgusted with himself for what he did or disgusted with the media at a particular question or bringing his behavior to light. The wrinkled, upraised chin and tight lips show the suppression of fear and also of anger.

Spitzer also has a cry cover smile. His chin is more raised and more defiant and proud and more of the bottom lip is raised and held inside the mouth. The corners of the mouth come down significantly in a way that is more common to this expression showing his need to smile through the pain. Cover his mouth and you see his eyes are more hooded downwards at the corners and sad. This combination reminds me of the classic sad clown painted face.


Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at http://pattiwood.net/. Also check out the body language quiz on her YouTube Channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Romney's Anger Real and Controlled According to Patti

Patti was interviewed by the Associated Press Friday on the recent Republican debate in which Romney forcefully responded to the remark that he was "anti-immigrant." Check the link below to find Patti's insights on Romey's body language.

http://m2.tbo.com/content/2012/jan/28/281231/romneys-forceful-body-language-scores-in-debate/news-politics/


Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at http://PattiWood.net. Also check out the body language quiz on her YouTube Channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Body Language of Mrs. Cain - November 2011

This is my body language read of Mrs. Cain for US News and World Report.

http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2011/11/15/gloria-cains-body-language-revealed

http://video.foxnews.com/v/1275490678001/mrs-cain-on-harassment-allegations-this-isnt-herman

Interviewer, “Let’s start with this.” Mrs. Cain says softly, “Ok!” but is giving a severe lip compression smile. I call this the zipped smile. Women use the zipped smile to cover their emotions, typically to cover anger. Our culture says we as women need to be nice, so we give a zipped smile to cover our anger. She nods her head up and down, but instead of meaning, “I agree” the small quick nods are saying, “Please hurry and get this interview over with.”

When she says, “I don’t know who that person is (eye block) pause misspeak “...and we’ve been married for 42 years.” She shuts her eyes longer than normal blinking in a window shade eye block. That indicates she is uncomfortable with the person (sexual harasser) that the media is projecting.

When she says a moment later “But, they don’t know Herman” her lip pucker quick downward dismissive head shake and stressed voice show her repressed anger at the critical media.

Look how she is sitting at the far end of the couch. The most honest portion of the body is from the waist down. Her lower body and feet are turned away fully from the interviewer. In this moment, though her upper body is angling slightly away from the interviewer in “retreat” and at times even leaning back away. Her arms are out in front and her hands are laying one over the other in her lap (called a blanket hand cross) to protectively cover her pelvis.

As to her husband warning her of the story coming out, she shakes her head. “It is just hearsay” and she gives a tongue drawbridge signifying her desire to get the bad taste of the news out of her mouth and off of her mind.

As Mrs. Cain continues and discusses the warning conversation with her husband and her faint memory (she looks up and struggles to come up with both the true memory of the event and the correct thing to say, true or planned response that may be a lie) of the first woman’s accusations and the Restaurant Association’s charges as being unfounded you see how her body is so turned away from the interviewer she has to twist her neck significantly to answer questions. My read here is she had an agreement in the marriage here that she wouldn’t ask and he wouldn’t tell.
When she responds to the second woman’s allegations, notice how she talks about Herman’s behavior in the PAST TENSE. “That wasn’t a part of Herman’s behavior.

She emphasizes his “Old School Behavior” - her gestures as she talks are in synch. She is telling the truth about his “old school behavior” with her and other women when she is with him.

When she says a moment later, “To hear such graphic allegations….that’s not the person he is.… (as she shakes her head no) he totally respects women.” You can “hear the tears” in her voice. Also look at the change in her hands. She now has a stretched out wrap over her leg protectively. She is feeling under stronger attack here.

Goodness I love the next part of the interview. When she says she was not going to be the wife up on the stage that he knew he would be there by himself. Her voice and nonverbal cues are absolutely in synch. She is being true and honest.

However when she says, “Seriously in my soul, I don’t feel like he’s that type of a person,” I see a pause in her head shaking, I hear awkward pausing and leaving out the IS in a slight grammatical error.This cluster of cues and even the wording she chooses sound less sure of herself. When someone is unsure they may leave out the strong words that make their message more definitive. We want her to say, I know he didn’t do these things but she keeps talking about the man she knew or knows not being that kind of person instead of speaking to his actual behavior.

As she is asked about her family’s reaction, Mrs. Cain kicks out her foot to show their anger, and sure enough says, “My daughter was angry…”

“NO I am not missing anything, I know Herman” she gulps showing she is keeping something in seems like she is gulping down her fear that she doesn’t know everything.

Again at the very end “SOME of the things that you are saying about him, that is not Herman.”


Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at http://PattiWood.net. Also check out the body language quiz on her YouTube Channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Why Black Women May Smile Less and Get Angry Instead

Why Black Women May Smile Less and Get Angry Instead

Patti, Christelyn Karazin here, the author of the book on interracial and intercultural relationships you spoke with a while back. Can you comment for, www.beyondblackwhite.com, regarding the issue of black women and why many just don't smile. Here's an article for reference: > http://www.theroot.com/views/single-minded-black-girls-puberty from Helena Andrews, author of Bitch Is the New Black.

Here are the rough notes from my response. Christenlyn. Fascinating

• smiling is sign of appeasement,
• people with lower status smile more often to get what they want,
• Women smile more than men in social settings.
• Men are often uncomfortable when a women who typically smiles in not smiling. (I believe men who say, "why aren't you smiling?' are concerned that a non-smiling women may be angry or trying to assert power if she is not smiling. Each time I taught my Women and Leadership workshops at the Wharton School of Business I would ask how many men have said, "Why aren't you smiling," to you and every woman would raise her hand.

Research also shows:

• High Status seemingly "Powerful people" smile less, Male or Female
• Men with more testosterone smile less and are quicker to respond with anger.

Here you have a fascinating and in some ways very sad, cultural and racial switch. So a women says, "I can't smile if I want to be powerful and accepted." to look tough and be accepted by my female peers “I need to sneer, and look like a bitch."

An angry face does get a different response than an appeasing smile. It can feel empowering. But at a great cost.

• A smile actually changes your brain chemistry so you feel happier.
• The "facial feedback loop" insures a smile is typically met with a smile from other people.
• Women who smile are typically seen as more friendly and more attractive
• Women who smile in the yearbook photos are found to be happier 25 years later.

A sneer is a prickly protective armor. You won't be stomped on, but you may keep people too far away to touch and hold you close. It may feel like it empowers you. Tyler Perry gets laughs by showing angry bitchy sneering non smiling women. The title character in the Stephan King movie Deloris Clayborn says, "Sometimes being a bitch is all you have to hold on to." sometimes the Black angry women in Tyler Perry's movies just complain, but often the angry "bitch" is energized to powerful destructive action. The iconic defiant sneer on the wife in the movie, "Waiting to Exhale" comes to mind. She goes from a happy smiling wife to a sneering ragging tiger getting mad enough at her unfaithful husband that she takes all his clothes and goodies like his golf club and piles them on his Mercedes and sets them on fire. The sneer on her face along with her defiant upraised chin as she watches the flames climb seemed to say to Black Women, stop smiling and taking it, get angry and start taking.

Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at http://pattiwood.net/. Also check out the body language quiz on her YouTube Channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

High-Testosterone People Feel Rewarded By Others' Anger

High-Testosterone People Feel Rewarded By Others' Anger, New Study Finds
ScienceDaily (May 12, 2007) — Most people don't appreciate an angry look, but a new University of Michigan psychology study found that some people find angry expressions so rewarding that they will readily learn ways to encourage them.


•"It's kind of striking that an angry facial expression is consciously valued as a very negative signal by almost everyone, yet at a non-conscious level can be like a tasty morsel that some people will vigorously work for," said Oliver Schultheiss, co-author of the study and a U-M associate professor of psychology.

The findings may explain why some people like to tease each other so much, he added. "Perhaps teasers are reinforced by that fleeting 'annoyed look' on someone else's face and therefore will continue to heckle that person to get that look again and again," he said. "As long as it does not stay there for long, it's not perceived as a threat, but as a reward."

The researchers took saliva samples from participants to measure testosterone, a hormone that has been associated with dominance motivation.

Participants then worked on a "learning task" in which one complex sequence of keypresses was followed by an angry face on the screen, another sequence was followed by a neutral face, and a third sequence was followed by no face.

Participants who were high in testosterone relative to other members of their sex learned the sequence that was followed by an angry face better than the other sequences, while participants low in testosterone did not show this learning advantage for sequences that were reinforced by an angry face.

Notably, this effect emerged more strongly in response to faces that were presented subliminally, that is, too fast to allow conscious identification. Perhaps just as noteworthy, participants were not aware of the patterns in the sequences of keypresses as they learned them.

While high-testosterone participants showed better learning in response to anger faces, they were unaware of the fact that they learned anything in the first place and unaware of what kind of faces had reinforced their learning.

Michelle Wirth, the lead author of the study and now a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, added: "Better learning of a task associated with anger faces indicates that the anger faces were rewarding, as in a rat that learns to press a lever in order to receive a tasty treat. In that sense, anger faces seemed to be rewarding for high-testosterone people, but aversive for low-testosterone people."
She said the findings contribute to a body of research suggesting that perceived emotional facial expressions are important signals to help guide human behavior, even if people are not aware that they do so.

"The human brain may have built-in mechanisms to detect and respond to emotions perceived in others," she said. "However, what an emotional facial expression, such as anger, 'means' to a given individual—whether it is something to pursue or avoid, for example—can vary."

U-M psychology researchers Michelle Wirth and Schultheiss, the authors of the study, published their findings in the journal Physiology and Behavior.




Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at http://PattiWood.net. Also check out the body language quiz on her YouTube Channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.