[Xmca-l] Re: What Faces Can’t Tell Us

[Peter Smagorinsky]

I don't think the only alternative to universals is a different form of individualized, acontextual inferencing. There's no effort to understand how the "subjects" from tribal societies came to form their responses. I don't see the lab as having any potential for a cultural-historical approach.

-----Original Message-----
From: xmca-l-bounces+smago=uga.edu@mailman.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-l-bounces+smago=uga.edu@mailman.ucsd.edu] On Behalf Of Martin John Packer
Sent: Sunday, March 02, 2014 7:17 PM
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: What Faces Can’t Tell Us

On Mar 2, 2014, at 1:55 PM, Peter Smagorinsky <smago@UGA.EDU> wrote:

> If faces do not “speak for themselves,” how do we manage to “read” other people? The answer is that we don’t passively recognize emotions but actively perceive them, drawing heavily (if unwittingly) on a wide variety of contextual clues — a body position, a hand gesture, a vocalization, the social setting and so on.

Peter, can you say more about why this bothered you? Yes, it's laboratory research, but personally I find these conclusions more convincing than the notion that there is a universal code of facial muscle movements.

Martin