Your Facebook Smile Predicts Life Satisfaction
Christopher Philip
Patrick Seder and Shigehiro Oishi, Department of Psychology, University of Virginia, USA found that smile intensity was a unique predictor of changes in life satisfaction over time.
Participants were first-year students at the University of Virginia who’s facebook profile contained at least one “non jokey” profile image. Students were given questionnaires assessing extraversion and life satisfaction across friendships, family relationships, and social relationships. The follow up condition was done 3.5 years later as the students were preparing to graduate.
Images were coded for positive affect. Here muscle action units (AUs) were measured for intensity. The first muscle, AU6, the orbicularis oculi, functions to raise the cheeks and causes squinting. It is the primary muscle used to discern a true smile from a fake smile. Real smiles create crow’s feet at the corners of the eyes.
The second muscle, the AU12, the zygomatic major, causes smiling via raised mouth corners. These can force a smile consciously, and therefore do not indicate a true smile from a fake smile. Both of the muscles were coded from 1-5. The two numbers were then summed to form an index totaling 1-10. These scores would serve as a comparison between individuals.
Overall results showed that women smiled more than men, but controlling for this, the researchers found that smile intensity, as expected, predicted life satisfaction. The participants who displayed a more intense smile in their first semester Facebook profile were also found to be more satisfied with their lives than those who displayed a less intense smile.
Life satisfaction at the end of college – 3.5 years later, was also predicted by smile intensity.
No effect was found with respect to extraversion. In other words, the level of extraversion versus introversion did not have an affect on overall smile intensity or life satisfaction.
However, smile intensity did predict quality and satisfaction of social relationships. Also, social relationship satisfaction formed a link between life satisfaction overall. So the more positive were student’s social relationships, the more satisfied they rated their life.
“In other words,” say the researchers “first-semester smile intensity predicted not only the level of life satisfaction 3.5 years later but also the change in participants’ life satisfaction from the first to the final semester at college.”
Drawing Conclusions
The first hypothesis, that extroversion might have an effect on life satisfaction, did not bear out. However, smile intensity did predict relationship satisfaction. Naturally, this simplifies a very complex causal relationship.
The researchers note that the findings present more questions than answers. They suggest that the way in which students smile in their profile pictures may reflect on how they smile in “real life.”
“If so,” say the researchers “those who tend to display more positive affect may seem more friendship-worthy and approachable.”
This sort of approach-signal may help students fit in social environments as it may make them appear more extraverted, agreeable, conscientious, open and emotionally stable.
The authors also suggest that a smile may elicit, from others, more positive reactions and these may lead to more positive outcomes. Hundreds of such seemingly insignificant smiles may be additive over the course of a lifetime.
Certainly, Facebook has been used in a way that lends weight to predictive qualities of smiles, as people frequently consult with it when “screening” prospective friends, dates, and colleagues.
Additional Studies Confirm The Power Of The Smile
In a study conducted in 2019 by Ernest Abel and Michael L. Kruger, Wayne State University it was found that smiles by professional baseball players, collected pre-1950 from the Baseball Register, predicted longevity.
In this case, the average longevity was 72.9 years for players with no smiles, 75.0 years for players with partial smiles, and 79.9 years for players with true Duchenne smiles.
To break the statistics down, players with true smiles were half as likely to die in any given year compared to nonsmilers.
Image Credit: Demi-Brooke
Resources
Abel, Ernest L. and Michael L. Kruger. Smile Intensity in Photographs Predicts Longevity. Psychological Science. 2019. 21(4): 542-544.
Seder, J. Patrick and Shigehiro Oishi. Intensity of Smiling in Facebook Photos Predicts Future Life Satisfaction. Social Psychological and Personality Science. 2019. 3(4): 407-413.