Why Too Much Smiling Can Be Bad For You
Christopher Philip
Too much smiling may backfire!
We used to think that smiling was good – always. That it could brighten our face, make us more attractive, and then feed-back into the deepest part of our brain to lighten it up.
Turns out, that may not be exactly true.
According to researcher Anirban Mukhopadhyay, associate professor of marketing at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, a smile can backfire when it is forced especially when used to mask negative emotions.
“Most commonly, people smile when they are happy, because smiling reflects happiness,” said Mukhopadhyay. “However, people also smile when they are unhappy, to mask negative emotion or to try and become happy.”
Therefore, a big smile’s benefit, forced or natural, depends much on the emotional motivated behind it.
When people force a smile when they are unhappy, it tends to be associated with negative feelings. Thus, a smile loses its connection to happy feelings serving to make the expression less salient.
In three studies, the researchers presented the subjects with various scenarios. In one they asked subjects to report how frequently they smiled a whether they believed people smile to feel good, or to force themselves to feel good. In another, researcher showed subjects funny images and told them to smile if they believe they were funny. In the final experiment the researchers had subjects list situations where they smiled because they felt happy and also had them manipulate their facial muscles to produce smile-like or non-smile like expressions. Life satisfaction was also measured throughout.
Results from the studies showed that those who typically do not smile when there were happy, felt worse when they smiled frequently. On the other hand, those who smiled often, felt better when they smiled more frequently.
“More generally, we think that making people who are feeling bad smile could backfire and make them feel worse, because they may interpret smiling as trying to become happy,” Mukhopadhyay said.
Therefore, smiling can remind people who smile infrequently of not being happy, according to the research.
Rather than forcing a smile, the research tells us that waiting for the negative emotion to subside is likely the best strategy to making a person feel better. However, those who smile more frequently by nature should feel free to keep on smiling, as this likely working positively to make them feel better.
“In practice, I think people can think about their own beliefs about smiling, see how they feel about how frequently they smile and adapt either their beliefs or their behaviors to make themselves feel better,” Mukhopadhyay said.
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Resources
Labroo, Aparna A.; Anirban Mukhopadhyay; Ping Dong. Not Always the Best Medicine: Why Frequent Smiling Can Reduce Wellbeing. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. 2019. 53:156-162.