12.06.2017 Views

The Ultimate Body Language Book

Create successful ePaper yourself

Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.

Much debate has been raised about the root causes of emotional facial expressions, that is if they are<br />

genetic or learned. In fact, the debate dates back to Aristotle and Darwin, even today studies still debate<br />

the universality of facial expressions and their relevance across cultures. <strong>The</strong> debate revolves around<br />

whether or not the language of the body stems from culture, and is learned, or if they are simply part of<br />

the human repertoire and exist at birth and are innate. For example, the Chinese stick their tongues out<br />

to display surprise, but this isn’t universally consistent. All cultures however, recognize laughter to<br />

express joy and tears to express grief. So while we might agree that some expressions are cultural like<br />

the Chinese tongue protrusion others are universal such as laughing and crying.

Hooray! Your file is uploaded and ready to be published.

Saved successfully!

Ooh no, something went wrong!