Emotional Expression and Physiology in European Americans and Hmong Americans (Updated over a year ago)
"Ethnographic and clinical observations suggest that Asians are less expressive than European Americans. To examine whether this difference emerged in online emotional responding, 50 Hmong Americans (HAs) and 48 European Americans (EAs) were asked to relive past episodes of intense happiness, pride, love, anger, disgust, and sadness. Facial behavior and physiological reactivity were measured. For most emotions, more cultural similarities than differences were found. There were some exceptions: During happiness, fewer HAs than EAs showed non-Duchenne smiles (i.e., âsocialâ smiles), despite similarities in reported emotional experience and physiological reactivity. Within-group differences between âless Hmongâ and âmore Hmongâ HAs were also found. Implications of these findings for our understanding of cultureâ“emotion relations are discussed."
Uploaded by Michelle Wang on October 29, 2008.