One might expect his face would show happiness,
elation, or perhaps surprise. In fact, what we see in something entirely
different.
Analyzing these photo images in detail, Dr.
Anne Nassauer, sociologist at the Free University Berlin, found that they
consistently showed sadness on Trump's face.
Thus we can analyze both spontaneous emotions
and the attempts at emotional self-presentation or deceit. On the whole, people
tend to think of emotions as expressed in the mouth-- smiley mouth, sad mouth,
etc. But the mouth has the muscles which are easiest to control, and this is
where we do most of our emotional
pretences and performances.
Emotions are expressed on three zones of the
face: the brows and forehead; the muscles around the eyes; and the lower face.
The eye muscles are hardest to control consciously, and these are the strongest
cues to the genuine emotion. Thus put-on or faked smiles are made with the
mouth, but the eyes and brows give them away.
Sadness is shown in the face by the following
clues:
-- The inner corners of the eyebrows are drawn
up.
-- The skin below the eyebrow makes a triangle,
with the inner corner up.
-- The upper eyelid inner corner is raised.
-- The corners of the lips are down, or the lip
is trembling.
(from Ekman and Friesen, 126)
The following photo shows the brows and eyelids
in the sad face, while the lower part of the face is neutral:
The right photo shows lips which are trembling
and tight, an unconscious effort to control the sounds of grief.
The next set of photos shows sadness in the
full face, with the two different sad mouths on left and right.
Close-ups of Trump's face as he acknowledges
his election match the sadness clues for brows and eyes. The photo on the left
shows slight sadness in the mouth as well. The photo on the right suggests an
ostensible effort at a smile (mainly from the diagonal naso-labial folds that
make a triangle shape from the nose to the corners of the mouth). But on the
whole this is the tight-lipped, tense mouth, an effort to control one's
emotion.
For further comparison, female and male
full-face sadness:
Sadness is expressed in different degrees: from
left to right, subtle, mild, and strong:
And in female faces: slight sadness on the
left, stronger sadness on the right:
Sadness can also blend with other emotions. The
following photo blends sadness and fear:
But this, for the most part, is not Trump's
expression. The following pair shows a blend of sadness and happiness on the
left; the right is a close-up of Trump's face as he appeared on the stage with
his family:
Here one can see clearly the contrast between
Trump's face and the happiness show by his family members: (Melania Trump
maintains her professional model's expression.)
The following photo of full-face sadness shows
sad eyes and brows extremely well, and also the characteristic lines in the
center of the forehead made by the upward pull of the inner eyebrows. This is
known as the Omega face, after the Greek letter.
Why is Trump sad, just when he makes his first
public appearance after being elected President? Later he admitted privately
that he had not expected to win, given the final polls. He was surprised by the
result; but surprise is not what we see on his face. Surprise is a rapid
emotion, and there was plenty of time to get over it during the course of the
evening as the results came in.
The sadness is peculiar to Trump. It is not
shown on the faces of his running-mate Mike Pence or of his family. Almost certainly
it is an unconscious emotion.
My conjecture (which agrees with that suggested
by Anne Nassauer) is that Trump was realizing his life is going to change,
drastically. He has been a free-wheeling entrepreneur all his life, the head of
a closely-held business. He has run it with quick decisions, exerting personal
control, relying on family members and trusted followers. It must have dawned
on him that he was entering an entirely new kind of organization: much more
constraining, more bureaucratic and political pressures, less freedom to buy
and sell, hire and fire at will.
I am not suggesting that these thoughts were
going through his mind. Trump's pattern is to put his thoughts almost
immediately into words, spoken or tweeted. But our feelings are a trajectory
going forward, against the background of our past. Donald Trump's first
reaction to facing the public in his new role as President-elect was sadness.
Sadness for what he was leaving.
References
Ekman, Paul. 1992. Telling Lies. Clues to Deceit in the
Marketplace, Politics, and Marriage. NY: Norton.
Ekman, Paul, and
Wallace V. Friesen, 1984. Unmasking the Face. Prentice-Hall.
"Mona Lisa Is
No Mystery for Micro-Sociology"
Trump election night photos online:
http://cdn20.patchcdn.com/users/22888363/20161108/013016/styles/T600x450/public/article_images/donald_trump_election_day-1478629237-5475.jpg
http://cdn04.cdn.justjared.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/trump-fam/donald-trump-wife-kids-family-support-him-at-election-night-event-19.jpg
http://fm.cnbc.com/applications/cnbc.com/resources/img/editorial/2016/11/09/104091942-GettyImages-621866218.600x400.jpg?v=1478892428
http://www.grandforksherald.com/sites/default/files/styles/16x9_620/public/fieldimages/1/1110/donald60min.jpg?itok=jyMwZT88
http://cdn.newsday.com/polopoly_fs/1.12589314.1478735864!/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/display_960/image.jpg
http://cdn04.cdn.justjared.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/trump-fam/donald-trump-wife-kids-family-support-him-at-election-night-event-19.jpg
http://fm.cnbc.com/applications/cnbc.com/resources/img/editorial/2016/11/09/104091942-GettyImages-621866218.600x400.jpg?v=1478892428
http://www.grandforksherald.com/sites/default/files/styles/16x9_620/public/fieldimages/1/1110/donald60min.jpg?itok=jyMwZT88
http://cdn.newsday.com/polopoly_fs/1.12589314.1478735864!/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/display_960/image.jpg