Communication though facial expressions

Isha gahlot batch-4

10/13/2011

Communication or act of communicating can be both verbal and non-verbal. When we communicate with more than words, it is known as non-verbal communication. Research shows that majority of communication is non-verbal. Non-verbal communication or body language includes facial expressions, eye contact, gestures and even the tone of voice. Facial expression is the position of facial muscles used to convey some emotion or feeling, ideas, sentiments and mood as well. They are a form or non-verbal type communication. The face is something that can communicate without even using the mouth to speak. Facial expressions can be a lot more communicative than anything else as human face is very expressive, it can express countless emotions without saying a single word. A smile, frown, raised eyebrow, yawn, and sneer all convey information. Facial expressions continually change during interaction and are monitored constantly by the recipient. The facial expression of another person is often the basis on which we form significant impression of such characteristics as friendliness, trustworthy, etc. there are seven universally recognised emotions shown through facial expressions: fear surprise, contempt, disgust, happiness and sadness. Regardless of culture, these expressions are the same. There is evidence that the meaning of these expressions may be similar across cultures. Some other feelings that can be expressed are: concentration, confusion, desire, excitement, empathy, frustration, love, etc. facial expressions are so strong channels of non-verbal communication because expressions are closely tied to emotions and hence they are involuntary. Therefore most of the times it is impossible to avoid expressions for certain emotion. Facial expressions being a type of non-verbal communication serves the verbal communication to a lot extent. When addressing a huge audience a speaker can reach out to his audience more with his expressions than his words if he knows how to use them wisely. In a person to person conversation facial expressions along with eye contact play a vital role. It is important to recognise that non-verbal communication is multi-channelled; hence focusing on a single aspect is reckless. A person's eyes reveal much about how they are feeling, or what they are thinking. Blink rate can reveal how nervous or at ease a person may be.

although in a person to person or a group conversation facial expressions may intensify the effect on listener, whereas wrong ones may end up messing the whole conversation and may result into sending a wrong or undesired message. Thus it is very crucial to use right type of facial expressions. However being spontaneous during a conversation may not allow a person to stop and think about what to say and how to say it. But during a formal presentation one can rehearse and according to his/her target audience facial expressions can be controlled. Facial expressions are practically the base of many types of communications. Facial expressions act as an ornament for various art forms like theatre, dance, and etc. art being important part of life, so it is worth mentioning here how facial expressions are important to these art forms. During live performances of a single or a band on stage facial expressions along with body language plays a vital role, even better than the lyrics sometimes. For artists who are stage performers it is very crucial to maintain good facial expressions on the stage. Dance forms like kathak and bharatnatyama are incomplete without the use of facial expressions as these dance forms are bound to be highly synchronised with facial expressions and body movement. It is worth noticing how good music sets the mood of an artist while performing to get the absolutely correct facial expressions. Thus it can be seen how various aspects of communication help each other to communicate well. It is obvious to say that facial expressions make theatre an art worth looking at. The better the artist expresses his/ her facial expressions and the better he/ she uses their body language, the more does the theatre becomes interesting. in all the mentioned art forms it is important to say that facial expressions alone cannot make it interesting to hold a sight but without the use of appropriate facial expressions these turn neither interesting nor worth looking at. Thus it ok to say that facial expressions make an art work a good one. Therefore Facial expressions are responsible for a huge proportion of nonverbal communication.

Professor Albert Mehrabian has pioneered the understanding of communications since the 1960s. He did research on body language and nonverbal communication. Brief points of his study are: 7% of message pertaining to feelings and attitudes is in the words that are spoken. 38% of message pertaining to feelings and attitudes is paralinguistic (the way that the words are said). 55% of message pertaining to feelings and attitudes is in facial expression. According to this study words play least part of communication. The tone used to say these words adds around one third part of message delivered. And a facial expression communicates more than half of the message. This means that, as the receiver of a message, you can rely heavily on the facial expressions of the sender because his expressions are a better indicator of the meaning behind the message than his words. Thus it is very evident that facial expressions are important while communicating. This can be put in way that facial expressions are the strong medium of communication. Hence use of facial expressions if used wisely can intensify the message communicated. Thus it is an important aspect of communication. There are many subtle types of communication that arent easily recognized but can be MORE important than what is verbally being exchanged between two people. All forms of communication need to be taken into consideration, and most are, unconsciously, between the 2 active participants.

Bibliography; www.face-and-emotion.com www.publicspeakingtip.org www.zeromillion.com