10.19.2010

bp's science: fake vs. genuine smiles (v.1)

We can thank my sister for today's cool post (I even used the same clip art she chose). She directed me to a BBC sponsored survey that shows quick video tidbits of 20 people smiling. It then asks you whether you think the smile is genuine or fake. At the end, you learn the difference between a fake smile and a real one (the two are signaled by different parts of the brain and thus look different!). My wise and scientific sister received a 15/20. So 75% of the time, she's in tune with people's sincerity. Myself, well I didn't fare so well, and got 9/20. This means that 45% of the time, I can tell if people really like my jokes or not. Maybe that's for the best. Anyhow, try this survey out yourself. It's fun. Then come back and tell me your score. Maybe, just maybe, we can learn a little bit about ourselves and come to some conclusions.

11 comments:

The Jeff Bylund Family said...

15/20. Interesting. :)

The Jeff Bylund Family said...

By the way, the smile at the end of my previous comment was a real one.

Jess said...

Nice one, Tammy. 16/20 for me.

Janice said...

11/20.

jo said...

This is so fascinating! Gosh, I can only impagine how fun this researcher had doing the initial study.

And didn't it make you want to try out being one of the people giving the fake/genuine smiles? I wonder how I would do trying to smile and then go back to not smiling that quickly.

Trisha said...

I got 16/20. For me the eyes were the giveaway for fake v. genuine.
Cool test!

ZhaoKids said...

16/20 also!! =)

kel said...

13/20 and kind of surprised i didn't do better as well. great post.

Chap said...

80%-I said that the throat showed if people were really smiling-wonder what they thought of that one!(did you notice how scary some people looked when they stopped smiling?) Do you think they told a joke to get them to smile?

ash said...

This has been so cool to see people's results. Thanks for participating. I'm trying to make a correlation between the high scorers and the low scorers, but I'm not seeing any clear observations. Plus, most people did splendidly. Maybe those who didn't do so well didn't share, or maybe I'm the only one in the single digits.

Angie said...

11/20. Wow, I am not very good at that.