KNOXVILLE, Tenn., U.S.: Dentists support people in keeping or regaining their smiles. More and more, esthetics is playing an important role in dentistry in addition to functional maintenance. Not having attractive teeth may cause people to feel self-conscious and prevent them from smiling. A recent study by researchers from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville (UTK) and the Texas A&M University found that facial expressions can lead people to feel the emotions related to the respective expression. Ultimately, dentists contribute not only to the physical health of their patients but also to their overall happiness.
“Conventional wisdom tells us that we can feel a little happier if we simply smile. Or that we can get ourselves in a more serious mood if we scowl,” said lead author Nicholas Coles, a doctoral student from the Department of Psychology at UTK. “But psychologists have actually disagreed about this idea for over 100 years.”
These disagreements became more pronounced in 2016, when 17 teams of researchers failed to replicate a well-known experiment demonstrating that the physical act of smiling can make people feel happier.
“Some studies have not found evidence that facial expressions can influence emotional feelings,” Coles said. “But we can’t focus on the results of any one study. Psychologists have been testing this idea since the early 1970s, so we wanted to look at all the evidence.”
Using meta-analysis, Coles and his team combined data from 138 studies testing more than 11,000 participants from all around the world. According to the results of the meta-analysis, facial expressions do have a small impact on feelings. For example, smiling makes people feel happier, scowling makes them feel angrier and frowning makes them feel sadder.
“We don’t think that people can smile their way to happiness,” Coles said. “But these findings are exciting because they provide a clue about how the mind and the body interact to shape our conscious experience of emotion. We still have a lot to learn about these facial feedback effects, but this meta-analysis put us a little closer to understanding how emotions work.”
The study, titled “A meta-analysis of the facial feedback literature: Effects of facial feedback on emotional experience are small and variable,” was published online in Psychological Bulletin on April 11, 2019, ahead of inclusion in an issue.
MALMÖ, Sweden: Even though Sweden has built a more robust healthcare system than exists in many countries, adults in the country still have a high ...
MELBOURNE, Australia: The idea that oral health comes down to genetics can be a damaging one. According to authors of a recent study, which followed the ...
WARSAW, Poland: There has long been a debate around what constitutes excessive time spent on devices and the adverse health effects of this. In a new study ...
MICHIGAN, U.S.: The role Medicaid plays in the broader community is a topic that evokes a lot of emotion across a wide range of fields. With five states set...
ATLANTA, U.S.: Poor oral health and hygiene are known risk factors for oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC). Researchers have now found that poor oral health...
PHILADELPHIA, U.S.: The powers of the tongue have been well researched. However, in a new study, scientists from the Monell Chemical Senses Center in ...
SAN FRANCISCO, U.S.: According to a new study, a multilevel approach that includes a dental caries risk assessment, aggressive preventive measures and ...
SHEFFIELD, UK: In a first-of-its-kind study, researchers from the University of Sheffield have investigated patients’ emotional challenges in being ...
DUNEDIN, New Zealand: Many of the issues around oral health in New Zealand are related to the cost of care. People at the lower end of the socio-economic ...
LONDON, UK: Though the exact number of people who suffer from xerostomia is unclear, some studies estimate that as many as one in five of the population ...
Live webinar
Thu. 18 July 2024
8:00 pm EST (New York)
Live webinar
Tue. 6 August 2024
6:00 pm EST (New York)
Live webinar
Tue. 13 August 2024
7:00 pm EST (New York)
Live webinar
Wed. 14 August 2024
12:30 pm EST (New York)
Live webinar
Wed. 21 August 2024
9:00 am EST (New York)
Dr. Jim Lai DMD, MSc(Perio), EdD, FRCD(C)
Live webinar
Wed. 28 August 2024
8:00 pm EST (New York)
Live webinar
Mon. 2 September 2024
5:00 am EST (New York)
To post a reply please login or register