This thesis describes a program of research designed to investigate the sensitivity ofperceivers to the ontological distinctions between simulated expressions of happinessunrelated to positive emotional experience, or, posed smiles, and spontaneous,veridical expressions of positive affect, or, genuine smiles. Importantly, this researchwas conducted from within the theoretical framework of Gibsonian ecologicalpsychology, an alternative approach to the information processing theories thatdominate contemporary psychological theorising.Four experiments were conducted that employed an original set of ecologically validfacial displays generated specifically for the present research. In Experiments I a and1 b, it was demonstrated that when jUdging from either photographs or video,participants could determine whether a smile reflected a positive emotionalexperience or not. Furthermore, for both of these studies, participants exhibited a biastoward misidentifying posed smiles that expose the teeth as genuine smiles.Experiment 2 also revealed findings consistent with the notion that perceivers aresensitive to the meaningful differences between posed and genuine smiles. In thisstudy, participants were required to judge the valence of a series of target words, eachof which was preceded by a briefly presented facial expression (i.e. a prime). Theresults of this study indicated that the identification of positive words was facilitatedwhen preceded by a genuine smile, but not a posed smile. Experiment 3 wasconducted to further investigate how such sensitivity may be manifest in regard toguiding effective social interaction. PartiCipants were required to play several roundsof the Prisoners' Dilemma game with partners (actually video recordings) exhibitingXlleither posed or genuine smiles. The results of this experiment indicated that genuinesmiles facilitated cooperative interaction, but posed smiles did not.The results of all four experiments are discussed in terms of the functionality providedby accurate social perception with regard to the acquisition of information specifyingthe emotional state, and more broadly, the dispositional properties of conspecifics.Finally, these results will be considered in terms of the ecological conceptualisation ofpsychological activity, with an emphasis on the social affordances specified by posedand genuine smiles respectively.
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