| Smile as you
read this. Okay, you don’t have to grin like a sap. But smile you must. For
it’s supposed to be a free therapy. Psychologists have something called
‘facial feedback’ hypothesis that states that your facial movement, even if
they are involuntary, are potent enough to affect your emotional expression:
they alter your behaviour. In simple terms what this means is the next time
you feel your-self sliding into the dumps – smile! Simply curve your lips
upwards and they will lift you mood in turn. Of course, more serious
alteration of your mood may require heavier sort of movin’ and shakin’. But
even this deceptively small measure can act as a trigger that ultimately
brings down the Castle of Gloom and Doom.
A number of research projects lend support to
the idea. One study found that participants who were instructed to make
certain faces experienced autonomic changes similar to those seen with
emotions. That is, a person told to make an angry face experienced increased
blood flow to the hands and feet, which is also seen in those who are
experiencing anger.
Participants from another study involving
posed faces reported more favourable impressions of other people when asked
to smile. Research has also found that mimicking the face of some-one else
elicits empathy. The sympathetic magic of the smile is caused by mirror
neurons in the brain, what the noted neurologist V.S. Ramachandran has
termed the greatest underreported discovery of the decade, one which
promises to revolutionise the psychology of the spirit and learning just as
the discovery of DNA altered biology.
Finally, research conducted by the computer
giant Hewlett Packard said seeing a smile could give more pleasure than sex
or eating chocolate! The amount of pleasure, however, seemed to depend on
who was smiling: a child’s face or that of a celebrity had a much better
effect than that of a politician. And receiving a smile from a friend or
relative seemed to generate higher levels of stimulation in the brain and
the heart than being given money or having a cigarette, clinical test
revealed. Of course, no one would deny money, given along with a brilliant
smile, would deliver a double dose of feel-good feelings! That’s what you’re
supposed to do during Diwali anyway: give the Baksheesh with a bright smile.
Banish the darkness! |
