Expression of Emotions

Emotion is an internal experience — it cannot be observed directly by anyone but the person having it. Other people can only infer someone's emotional state from the way it is expressed, through verbal and non-verbal channels that act as channels of communication and let us both express our own feelings and read those of others. The verbal channel includes not just the words spoken but also paralanguage — non-verbal features of speech such as pitch and loudness, and its temporal characteristics. The non-verbal channels include facial expression, kinetic behaviour (gestures, posture, and movement of the body), and proximal behaviour (the physical distance a person maintains during face-to-face interaction). Of these, facial expression is the most common and informative channel, since the face is fully exposed to the view of others and can convey both the specific emotion and its intensity, as well as whether the overall feeling is pleasant or unpleasant. Considerable research evidence now supports Charles Darwin's original view that the facial expressions for the basic emotions — joy, fear, anger, disgust, sadness and surprise — are inborn and universal across the human species. …