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    The way you smile on LinkedIn, a dating platform, or in your passport photo reveals more about your personality than you might think: research shows that we can accurately estimate key character traits of others based on how someone smiles in their photograph


    The way you smile on LinkedIn, a dating platform, or in your passport photo reveals more about your personality than you might think: research shows that we can accurately estimate key character traits of others based on how someone smiles in their photograph

    https://www.uva.nl/shared-content/uva/en/news/news/2024/09/the-smile-that-leaks-important-character-traits.html

    Bytes Europe

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    14 Comments

    1. giuliomagnifico on

      >For his research, Witkower focused on the so-called Duchenne Smile. This smile, which is known for communicating happiness, involves the specific muscles that raise the corners of the mouth, and that circle the eyes. For his study, Witkower and colleagues had a little over 300 people sit in front of the camera and asked them to smile. ‘About half adopted the Duchenne pose,’ says Witkower. ‘Not everyone smiles the same, but especially people who describe themselves as warm, trustworthy, conscientious, or less aggressive and hubristic naturally demonstrate that specific smile.’
      >
      >’Duchenne smiles can also tell others a lot about your personality,’ says Witkower. A second sample of roughly 1000 participants were asked to identify the personality traits of warmth, trustworthiness, conscientiousness, aggression and hubris, from either a smiling or neutral photograph of a person from the original sample. The assessment made by the viewers was compared to what the original participants said about themselves. ‘Viewers making assessments based on a smiling face were generally more accurate than those assessing a neutral face. In fact, the accuracy of these judgments was linked directly to observing Duchenne smiles.’
      >
      >According to Witkower, it’s not easy to fake this smile. ‘Someone who attributes colder character traits to themselves cannot easily switch to a smile as favorable as the Duchenne Smile. They may instead show an asymmetrical smile, or only smile with the corners of their mouth but keeping the eye muscles less engaged.’

      Paper: [Smile variation leaks personality and increases the accuracy of interpersonal judgments | PNAS Nexus | Oxford Academic](https://academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/article/3/9/pgae343/7738421?login=true)

    2. Orogenyrocks on

      None of my fellow Slavs were included in this study I’m sure, since we next smile in ID photos.

    5. kittenwolfmage on

      Welp, sucks to be me. I can’t control the muscles at the corners of my mouth so I’m physically incapable of smiling like this (deliberately at least, apparently it accidentally happens very occasionally when I laugh).

      Best I can manage is to pull them backwards in a dodgy looking grin.

    6. Kentesis on

      As a neurodivergent person, I thought this was something everyone picked up on…

      Other than looks, the next thing I look at while swiping on tinder is their smile. If there are no photos with a smile then I have my answer and swipe left

    10. alverena on

      Why would someone smile with happiness while making 3d retake of the official or semi-official photo for LinkedIn or passport?

      Plus sincere smile by request (of a researcher) is an oxymoron. Plus personality traits were self-attributed. Plus Duchenne smile isn’t that hard to fake if you know what is expected.