What Is a Resting Bitch Face, What it means and What You Can do About it, Body Language Expert Patti Wood give you RBF tips.

1. Your face can make over 10,000 different expressions and over 50 different kinds of smiles and RBF is actually a smile of contempt.

2. Contempt is a feeling that a person or thing is beneath consideration, worthless and deserving of scorn. When someone feels contempt, they often feel superior to others, though interestingly people in subordinate power positions can feel contempt for their superiors. Contempt is a sign of annoyance and sometimes a sign of anger and you can see therefor why seeing someone showing is disturbing.

3. What you are seeing is one side of the lip pulled back slightly or a very slight raising of the just the outside corners of the mouth and freezing in place (may appear as a slight sneer) and the eyes squinting slightly or a tightening around the eye and sometimes the addition of the “lines of focus” above the bridge of the nose wrinkling. It there is the one side up a form of RBF it indicates that the limbic system is showing the true emotion of contempt while the neocortex is trying to suppress it and the lack of symmetry of the mouth is seen by others not just as unattractive but that there is something wrong that is being hidden and it alerts the viewer's central nervous system to be on guard and creates a stress response.

4. The broader category of “Resting face” is the typically neutral expressions a face shows when you are not actively showing emotion but because of your facial expression actually do move muscles in your face whatever emotions you show the most may form expressions that someone feels often. Interestingly it can be the emotion that a person believes they are actually SUPPRESSING!” So people with RBF may insist that at that moment when they are showing RBF that they are NOT “angry” or feeling negative about a person or topic what is showing on their face is the thousands of times they have felt contempt/anger/negatively.

Whatever expression your face shows even if it's just a hint of expression that expression sends the message to your brain to feel the matching emotion and create the matching chemicals to RBF sends “prescription” to the brain to feel contempt/anger/disproval. Think of it as, like the lingering effects of a lot of alcohol in your body, you will feel it even if you haven’t had a drink in hours.

5. Though RBF is not gender-specific people often think of it as being a female expression and judges harshly in women. Research shows men give RBF just as much as women, but the expression is perceived as making the men seem more powerful.

6. There are gender differences in how RBF is perceived that are complex. Smiling differs in males and females with boys reducing big teeth showing smiles about the age of five and girls starting to smile more than the body in mixed-gender groupings starting in about fourth grade. Women smile more often socially to be liked and to increase the community. High-Status people smile less. Men who smile less have been shown to have more testosterone. Research shows that men are most sexually attracted to women who looked happy and are more uncomfortable around women who aren’t smiling. The United States, there is a greater sex difference among Caucasians in smiling, but this difference virtually disappears among African Americans. Men are often uncomfortable when a woman who typically smiles in not smiling. (I believe men who say, "why aren't you smiling?" are concerned that a non-smiling woman may be angry or trying to assert power if she is not smiling.

7. If you have RBF and want to get rid of it there are things you can do it.

Get Botox in the little V frown lines above your nose. Those lines just make you look angry they create that “prescription” for the anger that I mentioned in 4. If you have that one lip that is asymmetrical you can get Botox to correct it as well. There are some subtle makeup tricks to help as well look for video tutorials on those.

Do resting face check-ins throughout the day and self-correct. Look in the mirror in the morning and throughout the day and check on the cues that show RBF and change your expression to be at what you feel comfortable showing. You don’t have to smile if you don’t want to. Also do check in on how you are feeling as you go into important interactions and see if you can change your mood to what is optimal for the interaction. Do you want to feel confident, recall a situation in your life when you feel exhilarated and filled with confidence and as you recall it your brain will reproduce the matching chemicals? The same goes for happiness or other emotions. Research also shows that listening to music or singing or even imagining your self-hearing or singing a song that contains the emotion you want to feel, or show can create it so you RBF disappears. But, remember you typically have it, because you have felt it a lot so it's not going to disappear forever with one round of singing out Walking on Sunshine or Pharrell Williams Happy.

8. If you see someone showing RBF remember (especially guys) that being told to smile is supremely annoying. It’s condescending, for one. And it can make the non-smiler angry because at some level it’s a request that they diminish their power.

Patti Wood, a body language expert and author of Snap: Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language, and Charisma and has conducted research on smiling in the US and Canada.

Patti Wood, MA - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com.

Patti Wood, a body language expert and author of

Snap: Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language, and Charisma and has conducted research on smiling in the US and Canada. 

Patti Wood, MA - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com.
     

Trump, Hilary Clinton and Anger, What are the Gender Differences.

Gender Differences in Anger 

Unfortunately, we perceive women’s anger differently than we do a man’s. Research shows that if a man is perceived as emotional he is considered more credible for getting angry. But when the woman was perceived as emotional, participants became surer of their own opinion, even if they considered the woman credible. As the researchers in one study put it: “When a woman expresses anger, this does not just make her seem less credible, but seems to make assessing her credibility irrelevant.”(http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/people-reward-angry-men-but-punish-angry-women-study-suggests_us_561fb57be4b050c6c4a47743)

Patti Wood, MA,  - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com.
     

Gender Differences In How We Feel About Our Looks

Carol King and her husband wrote “You’re Beautiful as you feel.” It’s a great song lyric, and a great thought.  There are gender differences in how we feel about our looks. Teenage boys and men tend to look in the mirror and think, “I look great!” Teenage girls and women tend to look in the mirror or phone camera and see what they don’t like and think they are not attractive. In the age of selfies, we make faces in the mirror or change the angle of the camera and tweak the photos to make ourselves more attractive rather than accept our true selves.

I suggest that for ourselves and our children every time you look in the mirror smile and say something positive out loud like, “You Rock!”  What a concept. Accept yourself and think you Rock! You can also use other methods to build self-esteem in your children here.

Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com.

     

Male and Female Brain Differences?

Research on Lack of Differences in Male and Female Brains

Many of you know that I do research and speak on gender based differences in communication. There is always a nature vs nurture discussion. This research is interesting as it debunks research on brain differences between genders that many people have quoted for years. Using MRI volumes of male and female brains and also Meta Analysis of 76 published papers"The team's findings challenge the common claim that a disproportionately larger hippocampus explains females' tendency toward greater emotional expressiveness, stronger interpersonal skills, and better verbal memory." It will be interesting to how researchers in the field discuss this challenge to long held beliefs about what causes gender differences.

Date: October 29, 2015 Source: Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science

Summary:A research study has debunked the widely-held belief that the hippocampus, a crucial part of the brain that consolidates new memories and helps connect emotions to the senses, is larger in females than in males.

Many people believe there is such a thing as a 'male brain' and a 'female brain,'" Dr. Eliot said. "But when you look beyond the popularized studies -- at collections of all the data -- you often find that the differences are minimal."

Credit: © Tyron Molteni / Fotolia

A research study at Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science has debunked the widely-held belief that the hippocampus, a crucial part of the brain that consolidates new memories and helps connect emotions to the senses, is larger in females than in males.

Lise Eliot, PhD, associate professor of neuroscience at the university's medical school, headed a team of students in a meta-analysis of structural MRI volumes that found no significant difference in hippocampal size between men and women. Meta-analysis is a statistical technique that allows researchers to combine the findings from many independent studies into a comprehensive review. The team examined findings from 76 published papers, involving more than 6,000 healthy individuals.

"Sex differences in the brain are irresistible to those looking to explain stereotypic differences between men and women," said Dr. Eliot. "They often make a big splash, in spite of being based on small samples. But as we explore multiple data sets and are able to coalesce very large samples of males and females, we find these differences often disappear or are trivial."

Hippocampi are located on both sides of the brain, under the cerebral cortex. The team's findings challenge the common claim that a disproportionately larger hippocampus explains females' tendency toward greater emotional expressiveness, stronger interpersonal skills, and better verbal memory.

"Many people believe there is such a thing as a 'male brain' and a 'female brain,'" Dr. Eliot said. "But when you look beyond the popularized studies -- at collections of all the data -- you often find that the differences are minimal."

The study appears in the journal NeuroImage.

Meta-analyses by other investigators have also disproved other purported sex differences in the brain, Dr. Eliot noted. There is no difference in the size of the corpus callosum, white matter that allows the two sides of the brain to communicate, nor do men and women differ in the way their left and right hemispheres process language.

---

Story Source:

The above post is reprinted from materials provided by Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length

Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com. Also check out Patti's YouTube channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Hillary Clintons’ Body Language and Voice During the Benghazi Hearings.

What Hillary Clinton’s Body Language and Voice during the Benghazi Hearings Can Teach Us About Emotion and Perception

By:  Patti Wood MA, CSP

What was Hillary’s "Listening Face” showing us? And how a female voice is "heard" as being more emotional than a man’s voice. 

I was asked to read Hillary's listening face for Poppy Harlow’s show on CNN. I analyzed six hours of video as well as video from her previous hearing and stills that the media used to report on both events. Though my segment was bumped for a press conference about the massive flooding in Texas, I thought I would share what we can learn from a listening face.  Whether you love her or hate her you may be fascinated to see how different she was and to note how the media portrayed her. 

Here is one of the videos that I read:

http://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/2015/10/22/hillarys-listening-face-during-the-benghazi-hearings-origwx-allee.cnn/video/playlists/most-popular-domestic/

Clinton had to make a considered choice of what her listening face would be during the hearings.

There are gender differences in how emotions are perceived. The men questioning her were often loud, raging and abusive.  I have seen powerful men in her hot seat be loud and raging and defensive right back.  Being aggressive did not serve her well the last time she was questioned about Benghazi and she chose overall to be self-contained. It’s fascinating that many of the editorials have called her cold and uncaring. 

If she had been too emotional, or specifically, too angry in response to questions she would have been seen as a raging woman. Let’s be frank, as a women, she couldn't yell back without being called the “b” word. If she appeared too upset as key information about the attacks was shared, she would have been seen as an overly emotional woman.

Her “listening face” is often a "Cover Smile,” with her lips tightly pressed together and the edges in this case turned down at the corners ever so slightly. A cover smile is an attempt to cover true emotional state; her cover smile is slightly turned down at the corners.  If you look at the four stills I pulled whatever you may think of her as a candidate, she did a great job of being neutral.

Look at her photos:

  

I think the head resting on her hand is more to contain her feelings.  She is not bored as the media has portrayed her. She is calm outwardly and inside trying not to laugh at their behavior.

Men actually use cover smiles more often than women, and the turn down at the corners is more extreme and if you look at the eyes and the rest of the face you can typically see the emotion they wish to "Cover." See the photos here from my story on men's cover smiles.  Hillary has upturned full cheeks, her chin is up, along with her tight smiles are more sardonic. She is covering amusement or motherly frustration with their histrionics.

Read my story on men's cover smiles here:  http://www.pattiwood.net/article.asp?PageID=11722 

I would love to say something about her voice. For years we have heard her voice and I know I have thought it often high and shrill but it was not high and shrill during this testimony. She was very careful through much of the testimony to bring the register of her voice down.  This helped her tremendously. Men hear a female voice in a different section of their brain than they do a male voice. They actually hear a female voice in the auditory section of their brain (emotional) so when a man hears female voices they hear it as more emotional than a man's voice. 

The female voice is actually more complex than the male voice, due to differences in the size and shape of the vocal cords and larynx between women and men, and also due to women having greater natural `melody´ in their voices. This causes a more complex range of sound frequencies than in a male voice. What is interesting is that when a man hears a female voice the auditory section of his brain that is in his emotional right hemisphere is activated so he hears the voice as being more emotional rather than rational. Female voices sound more emotional to men than their own based purely on where they are processed in his head!!

Notice how you perceive the emotions of men versus women not only in political candidates, but also in your daily life. 

Here is a related article of mine on 

"Lying, the Body Language Mouth Cues, Cover Smile"          

This is an expression I call the cover smile. Yes, most people who give this expression believe they are covering their true emotions with a smile. They are giving out many cues that say what they are truly feeling, but they really believe they are doing a good job fooling you and perhaps deceiving themselves in the process. Of course the dog is just being cute, that video of him with the Chi Wawa was a set up. He will tell you all about what really happened in his Oprah interview. Here are the tips so you can learn how to uncover the lies of a cover smile.

This cover smile with lips pressed tightly together is typically found in men and I think comes from the need to keep a “stiff upper lip.” This is the expression described when someone is smiling through the pain. And their true pain as this set of body language cues shows is an attempt to hide many intense emotions of sadness, fear and anger. I see it in men who typically have very strong egos and power that are caught and brought down. They have spent their lives covering up their true emotions. 

There are several photos above of this expression in former Governor Blagojevich. Look at his chin. See the puckering of the skin. You see that puckering in babies the moment they are about to let a big ole cry. And that is what he would like to be doing, but he has to keep that in. In these photos I am not seeing true sadness, just the desire to cry out. True sadness would be visible with more of a pout, downward pull of the mouth and more puckering around the eyes. The muscles around the inner eyebrow are hard to consciously control.

If you look at the photo below you will see how Paula Deen’s inner eyebrows pull together and curl up. (They would pull more, but she may have had Botox or the muscle cut during plastic surgery.)

Congressman Wiener’s expression is a suppressed fear, disgust and anger. If you cover up his mouth and look at just his eyes you will see the whites around his eyes and his sideways glance, and wrinkled nose of disgust. The wrinkled nose is a unique movement of the face given in disgust. Symbolically it says I don’t like how this smells and physically it is an attempt to stop the flow of air and odor into the nose. If I knew exactly when he gave that expression, I could tell you whether he was disgusted with himself for what he did or disgusted with the media at a particular question of bringing his behavior to light. The wrinkled, upraised chin and tight lips show the suppression of two emotions fear and anger.

Spitzer also has a cry cover smile. His chin is more raised and more defiant and proud and more of the bottom lip is raised and held inside the mouth. The corners of the mouth come down significantly in a way that is more common to this expression showing his need to smile through the pain. Cover his mouth and you see his eyes are more hooded downwards at the corners and sad. You can also compare it to Paula Deen’s and you can see more wrinkle and pull in his eyebrows. This combination reminds me of the classic sad clown painted face.

 

To train yourself to read the cover smile start watching for it on TV. If you want to chuckle while you do it you can watch the characters of Modern Family who often hide their irritation with a cover smile. Here is a funny twist on the cover smile that shows in the character on the left how it can show light irritation and playfulness.

 

My clients in my speaking and consulting business ask me what it is like to be able to read people. Oddly I often think of this expression when they ask, because when you see behind the smile to the true heart of a person you often see their joy, their inner child and pain. The next time you see someone smiling through the pain, you can be compassionate and see the truth of their heart.

Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com. Also check out Patti's YouTube channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Research on Kissing Shows That Men Report That They Get More Intimate Kisses from Their Female Partner While Women Report Half as Many Kisses Per Day Than Men.

Research on Kissing Shows That Men Report 
That They Get More Intimate Kisses
 from Their Female Partner 
While Women Report Half as Many Kisses
 Per Day Than Men.

74% of the men reported higher intimate kiss frequencies than the women of the same couple. This resulted in a reported average of ten kisses per day from the males, twice that of the female reported average of five per day.

There are gender differences in how many kisses we think we give and receive a day.

Story Source:

The above story is based on materials provided by BioMed Central. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

---

Journal Reference:

1.     Remco Kort, Martien Caspers, Astrid van de Graaf, Wim van Egmond, Bart Keijser, Guus Roeselers. Shaping the oral microbiota through intimate kissing. Microbiome, 2014; 2 (1): 41 DOI: 10.1186/2049-2618-2-41

Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com. Also check out Patti's YouTube channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Tips For Self Promotion for Women How to Brag Successfully So You Don't Look Like a Show Off.

Nine Tips for Self-Promotion for Women

How to Brag Successfully so You Don't Look Like a Show Off

Here are nine tips for the best way to brag in a politically correct manner and how to

successfully and gracefully self-promote.

1.  Be fearless and speak well of what you have done.
Yes, there is a gender-based difference in how men who self-promote are perceived and how women who say their accomplishments are perceived. It can change, but the research still shows that in traditional gender stereotypes men are admired for their work, physical and monetary accomplishments and women for their relationships, nurturing, social accomplishments But, that perception can ONLY change if women are courageous and speak well of their accomplishments without fear.  A good rule of thumb when sharing your success is to see how, when and what men are sharing about theirs and by balancing what you share about yourself with admiration and others. By seeing what others do that you respect, and admire and complimenting them directly and speaking well of them to others even when they aren't there. 

2.  Choose to do things that are worthy of self-promotion.
Be courageous, take risks. By this, I don't mean take on more tasks and be a workaholic, I mean be thoughtful in your choices. Spend your time wisely and with integrity. Volunteer for important projects. Help other team members. Work on committees, (You can choose to be on committees with important people.) Speak up at meetings with great ideas. Take the lead position on projects, suggest and spearhead innovations.

3.  Learn to tell a short self-promotional story.
 “Last week the most fantastic thing happened... “I had the best week this week……”, “I feel so great about something that happened this week...” and then tell about one specific success. Don’t preface it with how tired you are. Don’t list all you did, or how busy your week was. Tell one very brief story. A hero’s journey is interesting.  A recap of your to-do list or rundown of all the things on your outlook calendar is boring. If you have not read, "The Power of Myth" find it or at least read about it so you know what a hero's journey looks and sounds like. Make sure you include brag bites―pieces of relevant facts, such as clients that you’re working with, how long you’ve been in the industry, or a project you’ve recently completed.  

4.  Be very careful of your tone and nonverbal delivery. 
Look at how men get excited and make the telling of their hero’s journey into a fun journey for the listener.  Don’t be haughty and don’t hog too much time. Think how men share a sports success story, “I hit a home run, I caught the ball, I made a hole in one." People actually ENJOY listening because they feel the pleasure, excitement of the adventure and challenge along with the storyteller. But remember, women have a narrower band of acceptable delivery options so you can't be over the top and again you must tell a shorter story than a man. 

5.  Send a thoughtful email to a specific person about your accomplishments.
Men will email what they have done to accomplish their projects and you can do it too. If you see a good example of someone stating an accomplishment in an email you receive the model it. Don't send a group email listing your checked off to-dos. If you are not sure how it sounds read it out loud or try it out on someone who can be brutally honest with you about how it sounds.  

6.  Make your work visible by spending time with people.
Talk to people who can recommend you. Take influential people out for coffee or lunch, stop by people’s offices and ask what they are up to. Spend productive time-sharing and visiting in the break room.
  
7.  Compliment and "brag on" other women. 
When you focus on others accomplishments and notice what is worthy of praise your energy is focused in the right place and you learn what matters. One simple way to give praise is with an introduction. For example, when you introduce your female friends, coworkers and business friends to someone new share their name and an accomplishment. "Jim, this is Sara Beckman, she just headed up the committee for our new quarter sales meeting and it was fantastic." "Tom, this is Morgan Tyler, she just spearheaded the new marketing project." "Karl, this is Veronica Mann, she works with our top client Prudential."

8.  Ask other women to brag for you.
If you have established healthy, reciprocal, working relationships with other women it is perfectly acceptable to ask them to help you by giving a brag boost. You can even ask someone to share something specific to someone specific. But if you do this, I advise that you always reciprocate. Be the person that says and shares positive things about others.

9.  Be a good listener.
We like people who listen to us and often imbue them with good behaviors. If you want people to listen to you share your successes, be the best listener for them. It will not only make you more discriminating about what and how you self-promote but more importantly it is just gracious behavior.

For other ways to look good at work you can check out other articles.
Five Ways to Give a Great First Impression
http://www.pattiwood.net/article.asp?PageID=11491
Nonverbal Cues of a Good Listener
http://www.pattiwood.net/article.asp?PageID=2323
How Do We Know Someone is Credible within Seconds of Meeting Them?
http://www.pattiwood.net/article.asp?PageID=10452

On a personal note:
When I was in my late thirties, I was at a party with my fiancé at the time and someone asked me what I did for a living. I said, "I am a body language expert and professional speaker."
Later my fiancé chastised me for saying I was a body language expert. I remember going through a cascade of different emotions and revelations at that moment.

First I felt shame at the thought that I could have been inappropriate and a braggart. But then I realized that was not what I should feel.  I should feel proud of being an expert. Then a stronger emotion took over and I was angry at my fiancé for not seeing me for all I was. Then I felt disappointment in myself as I realized that he might not even know all that I had accomplished. I had never told him.  
But, I did manage to do with him, something I had not done well until that moment, brag. I said, “I have several degrees in nonverbal communication, I taught body language at two universities. My body language class at Florida State averaged 150 students each semester and was voted one of the most popular college courses in the country. I have been researching and consulting on the topic for many years. I have written a book on body language. And I have been speaking on the topic to the top companies around the world for many years. I am an expert!”

I may have been inappropriate and given too much of a laundry list, but by god, I bragged.  It was a seminal moment. A watershed if you will, where I consciously took pride in what I have done and what I do.                                                      

Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com. Also check out Patti's YouTube channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.