Comments on: Smile and Others Smile with You: Health Benefits, Emotional Contagion, and Mimicry

By: Emiliya Zhivotovskaya

Emiliya Zhivotovskaya — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 14:40:19 +0000

Hi John,
Email me at mail@emiliya.com and I will send you the articles I have.

Warm wishes,
Emiliya

By: Jack

Jack — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 14:07:38 +0000

depression in young adulthood…

I personally agree with your comments, but there will always be some people who may not feel the same….

By: John Darling

John Darling — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 04:54:45 +0000

Emiliya,
I am a dentist working on behavioral change for bruxism. I am aware of lots of references to smiling and the release of serotonin, endorphins and dopamine, with a decrease in adrenalin and stress chemistry but am unable to locate the actual studies that support the claims. It makes all kinds of sense, but I am dealing with very evidence based professionals that will need to have good scientific studies to support any claims made. Can you help me locate the research and/or researchers?
Thanks,
John

By: Faith Jackson

Faith Jackson — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 14:08:40 +0000

Another thought. . .

I bet that people with Borderline Personality Disorder (as well as certain other mental/emotional health issues) deviate from the pattern of consistently mimicing others’ emotions. I would further guess that teaching these people to mimic others’ emotions might form a useful part of treatment. Too bad I’m not a psychology researcher! I’ll just have to keep experimenting on myself!

~Faith

By: Faith Jackson

Faith Jackson — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 14:06:03 +0000

Beautiful article, Emilya. I remembered how you talked about Positive Psychology when we met at Kripalu last spring and googled it recently. I was glad to find this lovely article e-mail, and even more pleased to see you as the author of the second article I received!

Hope you are well.
~Faith

By: Kirsten Cronlund

Kirsten Cronlund — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 11:21:51 +0000

Emiliya,

I am also fascinated by the role of facial expressions. I want to learn more about what Paul Ekman has found about the universality of expressions.

On an anecdotal note, one trick I learned a couple years ago from a good friend is to deliberately put a smile on my face when approaching someone I don’t know or with whom the conversation could potentially be contentious (like a sales clerk when needing to request a special favor). It has not been my automatic inclination, but since my conversation with my friend I try to remember to deliberately do it as often as I can. I think the reason why this works so well for me (and it does!) is because the simple reminder to myself to smile also reminds me that I am approaching another human being, rather than a problem to be solved. It puts me in a joining state of mind and triggers empathy in me for what the other person might be experiencing.

Thanks for the great article, Emiliya.

Kirsten

By: Emiliya Zhivotovskaya

Emiliya Zhivotovskaya — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 04:09:48 +0000

Thank you for the positive feedback everyone.

Gary, Thanks for the links.

Melanie, Feel free to e-mail me (mail@emiliya.com) if you’d like to discuss more body language/ mind-body connection stuff. I’m passionate about this topic.

Warm regards,
Emiliya

By: melanie

melanie — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 20:25:05 +0000

Emiliya,

I loved this article! This subject fascinates me and I was so pleased to see such a thorough presentation of such an important topic. A very well presented compilation of information! I want to link this to my website!
Thank you for all the effort you put into this piece.
Melanie

By: carolann

carolann — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 06:06:29 +0000

This is so FABULOUS! Thank you so much!!!!!!

Carolann

By: Gary Laffs

Gary Laffs — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 11:49:16 +0000

Also:

Check out, and stay with it to the very end; you’ll be glad

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNQGO8tM6WU&feature=related