Want to Know What Someone Feels? Don't Look at Her Face

Guess that's why they get the big money.  But researchers now say that the best way to recognize emotions in others is to -- wait for it.  Listen to them.

If you want to know how someone is feeling, it might be better to close your eyes and use your ears: people tend to read others’ emotions more accurately when they listen and don’t look, according to research published by the American Psychological Association.

Newswise.com reports that, in a series of five experiments involving more than 1,800 participants from the United States, individuals who only listened without observing were able, on average, to identify more accurately the emotions being experienced by others. The one exception was when subjects listened to the computerized voices also used in  he study, which resulted in the worst accuracy of all. 
 In each experiment, individuals were asked either to interact with another person or were presented with an interaction between two others. In some cases, participants were only able to listen and not look; in others, they were able to look but not listen; and some participants were allowed to both look and listen. In one case, participants listened to a computerized voice reading a transcript of an interaction – a condition without the usual emotional inflection of human communication. 
“Social and biological sciences over the years have demonstrated the profound desire of individuals to connect with others and the array of skills people possess to discern emotions or intentions. But, in the presence of both will and skill, people often inaccurately perceive others’ emotions,” says author Michael Kraus, PhD, of Yale University, at newswise.com. “Our research suggests that relying on a combination of vocal and facial cues, or solely facial cues, may not be the best strategy for accurately recognizing the emotions or intentions of others.”
Big duh.
But many tests of emotional intelligence rely on accurate perceptions of faces. “What we find here is that perhaps people are paying too much attention to the face—the voice might have much of the content necessary to perceive others’ internal states accurately," he adds. "The findings suggest that we should be focusing more on studying vocalizations of emotion.”
Kraus believes that there are two possible reasons why voice-only is superior to combined communication. One is that we have more practice using facial expressions to mask emotions. The other is that more information isn’t always better for accuracy. In the world of cognitive psychology, watching and listening at the same time actually hurts a person’s performance of both tasks.
“Listening matters,” Kraus concludes. “Actually considering what people are saying and the ways in which they say it can, I believe, lead to improved understanding of others at work or in your personal relationships.” 





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