Figure 2 - uploaded by Danielle K Brown
Content may be subject to copyright.
Source publication
This study identifies how audiences use nonverbal cues to judge specific character traits in political figures. Participants assessed pictures that showed the example politician making eye contact with another person with highest scores. His hand positions received the lowest character-trait scores. Findings show that participants associated direct...
Citations
... These results suggest that the properties and individual differences in the facial ensemble of each emotion affect emotional perceptions. impression formation [3]. The underlying mechanisms of facial emotion recognition have been investigated in previous studies about sociability [4,5]. ...
... Open Sci. 10: 220585 3 ...
A series of multiple facial expressions can be temporally perceived as an averaged facial expression in a process known as ensemble perception. This study examined the effect of temporal parameters on the perceived intensity of facial expression in each emotion, and how the effect varies with autistic traits in typically developing people. In the experiment, we presented facial expressions that switched from emotional to neutral expressions, and vice versa, for 3 s. Participants rated the overall perceived intensity of the facial emotions as a whole rather than rating individual items within the set. For the two tasks, a ratio of duration of emotional faces to duration of neutral faces (emotional ratio) and the timing for transitions were manipulated individually. The results showed that the intensity of facial emotion was perceived more strongly when the presentation ratio increased and when the emotional expression was presented last. The effects were different among the emotions (e.g. relatively weak in the anger expression). Moreover, the perceived intensity of angry expressions decreased with autistic traits. These results suggest that the properties and individual differences in the facial ensemble of each emotion affect emotional perceptions.
... In these and in numerous later studies in the same vein, researchers suggested that those expressions were latent attempts of hidden persuasion. More recent studies analyzed the appearance and nonverbal behavior of presidential candidates (Banning & Coleman, 2009;Peng, 2018) and of other politicians in real-life and laboratory situations (Haumer & Donsbach, 2009;Kilgo et al., 2018). Olivola and Todorov (2010) reported that facial appearance-based trait inferences following rapid exposure can predict electoral success. ...
The Media Bias Effect (MBE) represents the biasing influence of the nonverbal behavior of a TV interviewer on viewers’ impressions of the interviewee. In the MBE experiment, participants view a 4-min made-up political interview in which they are exposed only to the nonverbal behavior of the actors. The interviewer is friendly toward the politician in one experimental condition and hostile in the other. The interviewee was a confederate filmed in the same studio, and his clips are identical in the two conditions. This experiment was used successfully in a series of studies in several countries (Babad and Peer in J Nonverbal Behav 34(1):57–78, 2010. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10919-009-0078-x) and was administered in the present research. The present investigation focused on the interviewer's source credibility and its persuasive influence. The viewers filled out questionnaires about their impressions of both the interviewer and the interviewee. A component of "interviewer's authority" was derived in PCA, with substantial variance in viewers' impressions of the interviewer. In our design, we preferred the conception of Epistemic Authority (Kruglanski et al. in Adv Exp Soc Psychol 37:345–392, 2005)—based on viewers' subjective perceptions for deriving authority status—to the conventional design of source credibility studies, where dimensions of authority are pre-determined as independent variables. The results demonstrated that viewers who perceived the interviewer as an effective leader demonstrated a clear MBE and were susceptible to his influencing bias, but no bias effect was found for viewers who did not perceive the interviewer as an effective leader. Thus, Epistemic Authority (source credibility) moderated the Media Bias Effect.
... In my own work with colleagues, we have begun a program of research to attempt to link specific nonverbal behaviors with character traits, rather than resorting to the dichotomy of positive nonverbal behaviors leading to viewers' forming impressions of positive character traits, and negative nonverbal behaviors leading to impressions of negative character traits. In the first study in this line of work, we found that direct eye contact, sometimes referred to as "gaze" (Shah, Hanna, Bucy, Wells, & Quevedo, 2015), was the most important nonverbal cue a politician could make, leading viewers to infer character traits of intelligence, caring, consistency, and good leadership (Kilgo, Boulter, & Coleman, 2017). Smiling was the next most important nonverbal cue, being linked to impressions of leadership and consistency. ...
This is an English translation of a paper published in Chinese, also on this site. It gives instructions for calculating the Janis-Fadner Coefficient of Imbalance -- very useful with visual research.
Abstract: Scholarly studies of visuals have become more common in recent years including nonverbal behaviors in the visual corpus. In the first part of this paper, a step-by-step guide to measuring the tone of visuals using the Janis-Fadner Coefficient of Imbalance is offered and examples given. The second part of this essay argues the importance of including nonverbal behaviors in the corpus of research considered as "visual communication." It makes the case for why people's facial expressions, gestures, and body language should be considered as framing devices. In addition, it points out theories that can fruitfully be expanded by a deeper understanding of nonverbal communication processes, and describes some of the common ways to measure nonverbal communication used in journalism and mass communication. To cite this paper: Coleman, R. (2021). Studying visual communication using nonverbal behavior: Opportunities and challenges. Visual Communication Research, 1, 57-77.
... 4222). In fact, the combination of a direct look and a negative expression leads viewers to assume that the candidate has good leadership abilities (Kilgo et al., 2018). In this sense, candidates may use this information to shape the audience's opinions by staring directly at the camera and guiding spectators' gaze toward their eyes (Prinsen et al., 2017;Võ, Smith, Mital, & Henderson, 2012). ...
... Following Kress and van Leeuwen (1996), the smile and direct look generated a more positive perception because they activated the interpersonal function and reduced the social distance between the represented actor and the potential reader-voter. Furthermore, positive character traits, such as good leadership or trust, may be inferred from a smiling face (Kilgo et al., 2018;Peng, 2018). However, the difference obtained in the chi-square test was not significant. ...
... In the second question, participants were asked to rank candidates' credibility on a scale from 1 to 5. Table 4 shows the results of the answers grouped in three categories: low credibility (ratings of 1 and 2), neutrality, and high credibility (ratings of 4 and 5). (Kilgo et al., 2018;Knutson, 1996;Oosterhof & Todorov, 2008;Peng, 2018;Sutherland et al., 2013), the smiling expression or the direct look does not seem to lower the value of a positive character trait such as credibility. ...
Campaign posters are semiotic-discursive resources that form multimodal units of meaning. In political communication, voters' decision making is affected not only by the verbal message, but also by nonverbal indications or physical features (visual attributes) of the candidates. This study analyzed the relationship between visual communication and citizens' voting decisions in a political campaign in Colombia. An analysis of campaign posters in the 2019 Bogotá mayoral elections was designed using a multi-technique methodology. First, two eye-tracking experiments were conducted to assess attention patterns. Then, a series of surveys measured emotions in slogans. It was concluded that, in the Colombian scene, visual elements related to candidates' physical attributes have a small influence over voters' decision making. This finding contradicts the results of studies carried out in different contexts, namely in Europe and the United States.
