Stuff You Should Know - Does smiling make you happy?

Episode Date: July 19, 2011

You smile because you're happy, yet happiness research suggests the opposite can also hold true. Smiling may actually improve your mood. Open interpretation make for the best SYSKs, so prepare for an old-fashioned academia studyfest with Chuck and Josh. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Welcome to stuff you should know from house.works.com Hey, and welcome to the podcast I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant that makes this stuff you should know Hey, man, how are you doing? You're all smiles aren't you? I am. Is this this article that we're about to talk about did it make you smile reading it like the contagious yawning one? No, I'm pretty smiley though. You're fairly smiley. Unless I'm actively Pissed off about something and then I'll probably be smiling Okay, but you've seen me upset too that happens. I've never seen you upset

Hey, you just smiled just now. That made me smile. Was that a fake smile or was that a what's called a dukeane smile? That was dukeane, baby all the way. So we're gonna go with dukeane, but it could be dukeane There's two ends. So I think it may be dukeane a dukeane smile. It's French. It's named after a Frenchy Guillaume dukeane He's a neurologist one of the early ones where it was basically like oh, there's a brain there and it's in control of everything So let's test all sorts of crazy stuff. Yeah, and we'll begin the field of Neuroscience, right? Yeah, and in 1862 Sort of oddly at the time. I think there was so much more interesting things going on to study he figured out that

The you know, there's a natural smile and there are facial muscles Involved in that that are involved with the brain and so he said I will name it after myself Well, he was kind of an interesting guy and that he was from what I understand somewhat obsessed with the idea that That muscles were connected to the soul. Okay, which is weird because that kind of provides the basis of Later research into facial expressions and specifically smiling But he was kind of on to something in a weird roundabout way Yeah, but the the way that he isolated he was famous for isolating the facial expressions involved in the smile right, but he did it by taking a motion out of the equation and he did that by

Shocking the facial muscles of patients in his hospital That's how we that's how we identify what muscles were involved in a smile and genuine smile. Wow. Yeah, and Yeah, he was known to Basically shock people's faces. There's a picture of him with the patient these two These two basically rods that you would use to shock somebody and the person's going like Or I'm not doing this on my own, right? Yeah Wow, well, let's do Ken. Okay, and that was some pretty shocking experiment

station So do Ken right? Comes up with this smile and it's a that's the genuine smile There's also a fake smile and the do Ken smile also if you're interested Chuck I didn't send it to you, but there's this thing called spot the fake smile on BBC It's like 20 different pictures and you pick whether it's fake or genuine. I could pick that apparently people stink at it I didn't have time to really do it. So I don't know what my score is I did like four of them, but they were kind of hard

But the key is when you're looking for a genuine smile, the eyes are involved. You get the crow's feet. Yeah, right? Mm-hmm. You you're you get kind of squinty. Yeah, that's a real smile. Yeah smile is just the mouth Yeah, I have a jokingly doctored up photos of Emily and myself I'm like smudging away wrinkles and stuff and crow's feet. Mm-hmm. Just kidding around. I would know I don't know You know me and pictures. I don't care. No, you that's that's my bag But it Emily always says it looks like we're like smiling without our eyes It looks like you know that fake smile like you've been Botox, which will come up later Exactly in this discussion. So um

Um fake smiling real smiling obviously the one you want to go for is the genuine smile because you you can feel it It's like kind of starts in your gut and comes out of your heart. Yeah, right? Mm-hmm Um like when you see a guy fall down on the street and you just like you feel that sense of happiness, right? You know, yeah, you just start whistling maybe as you walk along your way. You're like, sorry, mister You'd need a hand Yeah, nope, and then you happen to have your your prosthetic hand in there and you let him pull it right out and you're like whoa Did I ever tell you about the guy in college that fell off his bike and

His books splayed out all over the street in front of like hundreds of students on campus Oh, wow, and he he just put his arm on his chin and started throwing through one of the books One of the better reactions I've ever seen that is awesome. Wow. I think that would have emotionally crippled me I was so self-conscious in college. I would not have liked that either. I would have been like, well, that's it for me in college Transferring yeah to a tent exactly in my dad's backyard So Chuck we've got the fake the difference between the fake smile and the real smile And I don't know if you notice this you're a little older than me But in the 70s and 80s were you aware that there was a lot of like this is a heyday of smile research

I didn't know that it sort of makes sense just because that's from the whole happy face boom Yeah, you know what's Forrest Gump invented that right with that smiley face t-shirt there Yeah, that was a big deal smiling was a big deal. Okay, so well people I don't know Funding into figuring out what you know just evaluating smiles and one of the things they found that was kind of surprising Is that that fake smile we were talking about the one that just Has to do with the the mouth and it's not necessarily connected to any emotion. Yeah the fake smile actually can lead to more positive feelings or a better sense of well-being at least in these studies that came out of the 70s and 80s

Yeah, there's no studies as it turns out But that's kind of weird because you know the way we've always thought of smiling is your smile is the result of positive feelings Not you can generate positive feelings from smiling right right? But there there are a bunch of studies as you say that and they found this body of research is is surprisingly consistent, right? Yeah And the in the late 80s This psychologist named Robert Zajon I took it as a Johnny. I think there's no Balkan. I know but they they add like I do they invisible

It's not silent. It's an invisible vowel. All right, this doctor from the Falklands. Where Balkan Balkans from the Falklands from the Falkland Islands Published a study. This smile stuff is making us so silly. It is He had subjects repeat vowel sounds obviously which would mimic either a smile or a frown So if you're gonna mimic a smile, you would do like an ee. All right, and if you were do a frown You would do along you you and even your brow furrows even though I think you're exaggerating But that's sort of what happens naturally to your face Eeeeeeeeeeeeeee

Right but what he was making them use these vowel sounds because To find out whether it has an effect positive or negative or young you have to take emotions out You want them to be emotionally neutral to begin with just kind of hard cuz I would be sitting there Kind of giggling anyway at the silliness of the whole thing but it's similar to like duken using the Shocks are trying to keep a motion out of it generating you like don't think of something happy. Just go ye right And they, in fact, reported the subjects reported feeling better with the long e-sound and the feeling bad with the u. So there you have it. Case closed, right?

Ta-da! Yeah, I guess I do kind of, you know, I have problems with studies like that. Any time it's a, they base everything on a measure of reported well-being, subjective well-being. Sure. Like, we've talked a lot about happiness. Yeah. We've got an audiobook just sitting there that we've never released on happiness. Just gathering dust. Yeah.

So we know a lot about this and we know that there are a lot of studies out there that are just kind of like, you know? Yes. And if it were just this one, I would be poo-pooing it. But there's a bunch of other ones that have kind of followed similar methodology and have come up with similar results. Well, rather than making vowel sounds, there was another study that had people hold a pencil in their mouths. Either sideways or... Sideways to make, it mimics the smile or sticking out, which makes a pout. Right.

Out makes a pout. Always remember that. There's your mnemonic device. Right. And they found the same thing, that people who were, who had the pen sticking out of their mouths were unhappier afterward. And people who were holding the pencil or pen lengthwise were happier afterward. That's right. Again, self-reported, but this is kind of strange that people are still coming to the same conclusion. Yes.

And yet another, Josh, had three groups of people. One was shown pictures of facial expressions. Another group made those facial expressions. And yet another made those expressions while looking at themselves in a mirror. And then they were asked questions that pinpointed their emotional state before and after. And overwhelmingly, they scored happier after smiling. And the mirror subjects saw an even more pronounced change in mood than those who didn't see the mirror. So it went, the people who just looked at pictures of people smiling didn't have much of a change.

People who smiled. They didn't have any at all. That's what it says. The people who smiled but didn't look at pictures and didn't look into a mirror had some change. Yes. But the people who smiled but looked into a mirror had, like, through the roof change, right? That's the jackpot. That's when you're looking.

You're like, hey, look at you. I like that guy. He's smiling. I'm smiling right back. And it's just a love fest. That's funny. I'm always disappointed when I look in the mirror, even when I'm smiling. Oh, yeah?

Yeah. But I don't even look in mirrors that much anymore. I think we've talked about that. Yeah, we have. And probably in the Howl Meers work episode. That's right. I'm going to suspect that one. Although that little trick mirror, we were on that film shoot not too long ago, and they

had one of those mirrors that makes you all squatty. A fun house mirror. I think you and I, like, five-year-old stood in front of that thing for 30 minutes laughing. The funniest part was you and I are, like, going up and down. We're playing in the mirror, but then the crew was just walking by. Right. And they looked really deliberate. Yeah.

They looked like lollipop guild members. Look at that little person there carrying that light. But with big feet. Right. That was pretty cool. Fun house mirrors are the best. But this kind of raises a big question. Like, why would looking in the mirror increase your happiness more than just smiling?

Right. Unless you love yourself. I mean, that's an explanation. Sure. But you're probably going to lose your funding if that's what you come up with. Instead, these researchers who conducted this particular study suggested that there's a self-conscious aspect to smiling. Right.

Which is where, so in the group that just smiled, if there were people who were introspective, who thought about their feelings, who were aware of their changes in emotion, those people would have had the most boost in happiness from just smiling. But looking in the mirror, you take all those people who aren't necessarily introspective and force them to confront their change in emotion by making them watch themselves smile. And so that almost is a supplement to self-consciousness. If you're not self-conscious, this simulates that phenomenon. Indeed.

You see what I'm saying? Yeah. Like, you don't have to just sit there and think, oh, I'm smiling right now. You can see it. You're taking it in. So they think that there's a psychological aspect to it, but this guy, Robert Zajanik, that's what we concluded his name is, he suggests that there's a physiological basis for it. Right.

So there's maybe both. That's right. So the only thing we're missing now is what Duken thought, which is that their facial muscles are connected to the soul. That's right. And then everybody will just be happy and covered. That's right. Yeah.

Josh, this goes back to one Chucky Darwin. Yeah. He actually thought of this stuff back in the 19th century that facial expressions don't only reflect emotions, but could be the cause of them. And then he got busy with, you know, the whole other stuff that he did. It's that little matter of the Galapagos. And it kind of sat on the back burner until the 80s when these new dudes started studying it.

And Dr. Zajanik looked at the research a little further and basically says, you know what? I've got a physiological reason. I've got a hypothesis here. Why a smile might trigger happiness and it has to do with the temperature of your body parts change when there's activity there in the muscles and there's chemical activities that happen in that area as well because of that temperature change. Just like in smiling. Right.

There was other research that I don't think had anything to do with smiling that found right that changes in temperature in the brain led to biochemical changes, right? So like maybe more of an endorphin was released when it's cooler or basically what they found was when you, you can connect emotions to temperature, a warmer brain is an anxious brain. Yes. Maybe it has to do with fight or flight. Sure.

A cooler brain comparatively is a happier brain. And Zajanik said, okay, well, how does this relate to smiling? And what did he find? Well, the answer is in the carotid artery. That's right. Not the carotoid artery as some people mistakenly say. And that is the pipe that delivers most of the blood to the brain flows through an opening called the cavernous sinus.

And that's got a lot of facial veins there. So when you smile, those muscles tighten, those veins are constricted, it's going to cut down the blood flow going through the carotid artery and you're going to get a cooler brain. Right. So it's going to make you happier. But he said also conversely, when you frown, it actually relieves even more pressure on that carotid artery.

So more blood flows? More blood flow equals more higher temperature in the brain. And we're talking about such a minute change, but it certainly makes sense that if our brains are sensitive, if the chemical processes in our brains are sensitive to very minute changes, which I imagine they would be, then this explanation is perfectly rational, reasonable. It's not supported in any way. None of these studies show definitively that, yes, smiling makes you happier. But the results suggest that there's a pretty good chance that people become happier just

from smiling, even faking it. Yes, but you found a study that refuted that, Josh. Well, let's talk about the Botox first. Yes. Two more studies, both very interesting. So the Botox one, remember- Kind of supports this. We were saying like with the shocks, Duchenne shocks, or using the pen, you're trying to

take a motion out of the equation to see if facial expressions can create a motion. With Botox, it's doing the opposite. You're taking the facial expressions out to see how that affects emotions. And what they found, there was a study from 2010 from Barnard College in New York that found that people who have Botox- Botox, I'm sure most people know, but it's a toxic protein. It's botulin. Yeah, that they inject into your skin to basically paralyze it so like you don't have

that troublesome space between your eyes when you frown or your forehead doesn't crinkle up or your crow's feet don't crinkle up when you smile. It paralyzes the nerves. Yes. And it's sort of creepy looking sometimes, but if it's subtle, it's not too bad. Right. But it's super popular these days. It is, to have botulin injected into your face is very popular.

Yeah, it is. Pretty neat. We have finally arrived at the dystopian future that's been predicted forever. But what they found was that people who had Botox injected reported, they showed them basically like tear-jerker clips from movies or something like that. Like Annette Benning's on a couch and she's like crippled or something like that. Yeah, like Sweet Home Alabama or something. Yeah, exactly.

Like at the end when things turn out right for everybody. And the people who had received Botox injections reported less of an emotional response than people who've been given restiline, which is another injection, but it's a filler. It doesn't paralyze anything. Yeah. So basically the idea is... It matched their face. The results were that if you can't produce a facial expression, then your emotional experience

is slightly lessened. Yeah. It's muted. So this shows both ways. Facial expressions are somehow connected to emotion. True. So. To producing emotion.

The other study which I like talks about fake smiling. Yeah. You know, turn that frown upside down and you won't be so gloomy. Not true. Fake smiling can actually make things worse. So Walmart creators, when you're being told to smile on your job, that can actually bum you out more. Oh yeah.

And that's the reason. Can't you just... That's one reason. Didn't you intuitively know this already? That that poor schmo whose job it is to smile at everybody is probably the one who wants to punch you in the stomach most? Yeah. By the end of the day.

Yeah. But it's just interesting because all these other things say like a smile can actually increase your emotion. But it's got to be a real smile, a fake smile has the reverse effect and they actually did some research on this. Yeah. Michigan State 2011 study. Go Spartans.

It was in the Academy of Management Journal and basically this professor, he's a professor of management. He studied a group of bus drivers over two weeks and found that the ones who fake smiled the most had more withdrawal and emotional exhaustion. And had less hemorrhoids. Probably. So basically that's surface acting. Fake smiling.

Yes. But he did find also that deep acting which is where you're like trying to cultivate a more positive outlook inside yourself. Yeah. Like thinking of a really pleasant memory that genuinely makes you happy. Right. You doing that can lead to actual more positive feelings and better performance at work because again it's a management study so that's what they care about.

But you actually do experience more better feelings. There's a positive effect rather than an emotional withdrawal or waste that comes from fake smiling. Which makes sense to me because I mean think about it like facial expressions are, we've always assumed designed for another person. This is how I'm feeling right now, respond accordingly. If you are misleading everybody you're going to at the very least feel like you're not connected to anyone because there's no one who is understanding you. Yeah.

They said it causes feelings of inauthenticity. Which makes sense. And they also found that women who are typically viewed as more emotional than men got in worse moods with the fake smiling and reacted even more positively when they were deep acting and really able to conjure up those pleasant feelings. Puppies. Yeah. So men are just apes.

Well another study, 2005 Minuit University study, found that women are likely to smile whether they feel like smiling or not in almost all social situations compared to men. Yeah. So they're not men. That explains why women are often emotionally exhausted. Yeah, my mom was much more inclined to put on a happy face around other people than my dad was. My dad would literally just like go off by himself and sulk in front of everybody and

just be like, here's me. But still in 2011 the point they were at is putting pens in people's mouths and telling them to make EE sounds. In our small research this is where we are. But at the very least the findings are, they're interesting. Hey man, it has been forever since we've done like a study fest. Yeah. This feels like 2008, 2009.

Crazy. Yeah. You know we've been doing this for more than three years now. Really? Yeah. That means Sarah, our fan, is... She's like 90. No, she wrote recently.

I think she's 14 now. She's 15? 14. Is she 14 now? Yeah. Yes, she's 14. She's on the Facebook page now. Did she see her?

No, I haven't. I've just turned on the turn button. Well, that's great. Well, that's it for smiling. I'm done smiling for the day. Yeah. I don't feel like being emotionally withdrawn and exhausted. Although our next podcast that we're recording is pretty fun.

It is. But that'll be a genuine smile. Yes. Okay, so Chuck, you got anything else? No. Just to plug the fact that we're on the radio now, you can listen to us on Friday nights from 7-8 if you're in the New York area, New Jersey area on WFMU 91.1. As a matter of fact, we cover the whole Hudson Valley like a wet blanket that's been left

out in the street for a couple of days. Hudson Valley, you can find us at 90.1 Fridays from 7-8. And big thanks to Ken Friedman. Yeah, huge thanks. Ken Friedman's like, he should wear a cape. Yeah, he might. He probably does. But Ken is at WFMU and he's like everyone we've talked to in public radio because we've

talked to other folks has said, boy, Ken is like one of these standup guys. Yeah. So thanks, Ken. And if you're listening to this right now on WFMU, we'll bet you appreciate Ken yourself. Oh yeah, I think so. Okay, so what do you want to do listener mail now? Oh, if you want to know more about smiling and happiness, type happy in to the search bar at our beloved venerable website, howstuffworks.com, and it's going to bring up a ton of stuff.

Yeah, there's a lot of happiness. There was so much happiness stuff that we wrote like last year. Boy, people love studying emotion. Yeah. Yes, they do. Those psychologists, that's just, that's their thing. It certainly is. Let's make people cry and then ask them about it.

Let's make people, let's shock people in the face. We got to get that happiness audiobook release time. Is it still relevant? Sure it is. Okay. It was evergreen. It was timeless, classic. Yeah, I said howstuffworks and handy search bar, so listener mail.

Should we go with underground railroad or fear orgasms? I think. Fear orgasm. Okay. I got permission to read this, by the way, as I do all of them. Hi guys, love the podcast. Thanks for making me learn and laugh. I swear the following story is true, bizarre but true.

So I'm listening to the Fear podcast at the gym today and you gave an example of men asking women out after experiencing fear because they feel invisible or sexual and Josh said something like, if you've ever had a strange reaction to fear, let us know. Invincible? Invisible. I think she meant invincible. Maybe so. Okay.

Last month I had a truly bizarre experience related to fear. My boss was out of town, he put me in charge of a webinar he had planned to do and I've moderated them before but this was the first time I had to make sure all the mechanics worked correctly. About 50 people were expected to join, I'd practice thoroughly, going through it a few times to make sure I had it down. When the day came to do the webinar, I loaded it up two hours beforehand to make sure it was all ready and it did not work correctly.

I read through my notes and tried again. I could not get the slides up and started to panic. I can't get the phone lines to work all of a sudden. I try again and again and I am panicking now. I call the client to let them know my difficulties. At this point, I am really panicked. It's been two hours, folks sending me texts while they can't connect, sending e-mails. I like the build-up here, especially if you know it's coming, you're like, here it comes.

Two phone lines went down, no way to reach the software support line and 50 people waiting for me to connect them to the webinar that is supposed to start right now. I'm shaking with anxiety and guess what my body does? I have an intense orgasm and then another one. He doubled down. I'm thinking my body was trying to get rid of extra energy so I could focus, which kind of makes sense. Or it's just like, enough of this, let's party.

Who knows? It was so unexpected that I almost started laughing and no, I have not told many people about this. I'm not sure how... Just told a few hundred thousand people. You can share it if you find it of interest, but please only use my first name. Julie, I wrote her back and said, yeah, I really would like to read this and by the way, good for you.

She said, yeah, right? That's that. Now she goes into bear dens and she hang glides and does all sorts of crazy stuff, I hope that. Yeah, exactly. Crazy. I just made up that last name and literally she didn't send her last name in. So for all those years that I was stumbling around in the dark, not knowing what the heck

was going on, I should have just mounted a webinar. So I don't even know what to call for now. Let's see. If you've ever encountered a bear, let us know. Yeah, we don't get too many outdoorsy emails these days. How about that? If you've ever encountered a bear, tell us about it. And you can tweet to us, right, SYSK podcast, which by the way, I should tell you, we have

a little campaign going that started last night. Oh really? A guy named OMG Chris, that's his Twitter handle, OMGCHRISS, right? Okay. So he asked us to take a vacation because he wanted to catch up and I tweeted that like many other people have caught up and succeeded, you know, you need to. So I asked all of our fans and followers on Twitter to let Chris know that he can do it and there's a hashtag now, it's poundchristcandoit and all these people send in these words of

encouragement and tips on how to catch up. Some people listen to us at 1.5 or 2 times and they say your laugh is very funny at twice the speed. I've gotten a lot of people that said they do that. So if you want to encourage Chris, I've been retweeting a lot of words of encouragement, but you can send him a tweet and CCS on it and then make sure you use the hashtag poundchristcandoit, right? Is it CHRISS?

No, it's just CHRISS can do it. Okay. Good thinking. Awesome. And then also we're on Facebook, facebook.com slash stuff you should know. Yes, indeed. And you can send us your bear stories at stuffpodcastathowstuffworks.com. Be sure to check out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future.

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