Saturday, March 28, 2015

Nonverbal Communication Analysis No. 3139: "Villanova Piccolo Girl" on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon - Fully Sincere (Duchenne) Smile vs. Sincere yet Suppressed Smile (VIDEO, PHOTOS)




Roxanne Chalifoux (aka Villanova Piccolo Girl) drew on our national empathy when, despite her Basketball team's March Madness loss - she played her piccolo through her tears. No fear .... Jimmy Fallon and The Roots to the rescue!


Notice Ms. Chalifoux's central forehead - it's contracted and elevated with its peripheral portions relaxed (an elevated-CFC). Her inner (medial) eyebrows are also elevated. Of course we can see the tears - yet this forehead configuration is highly indicative of emotional or physical pain - and only because she is forcing herself to play the piccolo through her tears, does her mouth not also adopt a correspondingly saddened form.
 

A few days later on with Jimmy Fallon, Ms. Chalifoux is displaying a sincere smile - the components of which include a relaxed (non-contracted) forehead, partially closed eyelids, dynamic concave-up furrows in the lower eyelids and upwardly contracted cheek muscles. All of these ingredients are required in order for the smile to be a sincere one (Duchenne smile).



A little-discussed component of a sincere smile which is extremely subtle but also present here - is a dynamic lowering of the entire width of the eyebrows.

The mouth is not required to be opened in order for the smile to be a sincere one - yet a fully expressed sincere smile does indeed display the teeth - however only the upper ones (exceptions here are when there is a camera angle is looking downwards [or if the observer is relatively taller to afford a similar angle], if the smile was sincere - but through fatigue is losing its vigor, or if the smile is transitioning from or to sincere laughter [sincere laughter may display both upper and lower teeth]).


In this moment, Roxanne Chalifoux has all the facial components of a sincere smile displayed above - EXCEPT the mouth portion is suppressed . It's profoundly important to note that this is still a sincere smile - albeit suppressed.

An interesting additional corollary is noted here with respect to Ms. Chalifoux's blushing. There often tends to be a persistence of blushing - or often an in increase - during moments of suppression of mouth smiling. This is a form of what in body language parlance is termed "leakage" - when attempting to suppress an emotion by not displaying one nonverbal component (e.g., here the full mouth element of a smile) - another nonverbal component (e.g. in this example blushing) persists or grows stronger.

See also:

Nonverbal Communication Analysis No. 3138: Wisconsin's Nigel Hayes, "God She's Beautiful" and Body Language

Nonverbal Communication Analysis No. 3125: Vladimir Putin, Suppressed Smiling & Blushing - Body Language

Nonverbal Communication Analysis No. 3056: Jeb Bush Interview - 14 Dec. 2014 - Body Language Tells

Nonverbal Communication Analysis No. 2554: Harry Reid's Body Language Lets Us Know What He's Thinking - Short Term Debt Limit Hike

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