Isolating cues to social judgements from faces: The possible effects of hairstyles

Abstract

A previous study provided evidence for the existence of “nonverbal accents” by demonstrating differences in judgements by American observers of the nationality of Japanese national and Japanese American emotional and neutral expressions. The stimuli used in that study, however, confounded differences in potential contextual cues such as hairstyles with nationality. To test whether any contextual cues may have contributed to differences in judgements of nationality, we replicated that study and tested whether one type of contextual cue—hairstyles—affected nationality judgements. Hairstyle differences contributed to differences in judging nationality, especially in judgements of Japanese nationals. These findings suggested that participants may have been able to distinguish the nationality of the expressors not because of a variation in facial expressions of emotion but because of other factors such as hairstyles. The findings raise questions about the basis of nonverbal accents in facial expressions.