Communication of emotional intent by facial expression.

An experiment to: (a) ascertain the extent to which college students (expressors) can convey to other students (judges) via facial expressions alone, their emotional intent and (b) determine some correlates of this enactment ability. 50 expressors portrayed 10 emotions to 4 judges. Results: (a) The expressors were all able to enact recognizably at levels better than chance, but there were considerable individual differences in this ability. (b) Happiness, love, fear, and determination were more often accurately recognized than disgust, contempt, and suffering. (c) For these enactments, the Woodworth-Schlosberg scale was found to contain 5 rather than 6 categories and was not circular. (d) Contrary to expectation, no personality correlates of enactment ability were found. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)