Please come and join us for:
WHAT: a research presentation by Dr Belinda Craig, University of New England.
WHEN: Tuesday 2rd April, 2019, 12-1pm
WHERE: Keats Reading Room AVLG17, Aviation Building, Callaghan (Video link to Ourimbah Meeting room, Science Offices; zoom linkZoom link:: https://uonewcastle.zoom.us/s/979950681
Zoom ID 979950681)
TITLE:Hairy and scary: Beards enhance recognition and detection of interpersonal threat signals
ABSTRACT: The beard is arguably one of the most obvious signals of masculinity in humans. Darwin suggested almost 150 years ago that beards evolved to communicate formidability to other males, but no studies have investigated whether beards enhance recognition or detection of interpersonal threat signals (like anger). I will present some of our recent findings demonstrating that the presence of a beard increases the speed and accuracy of recognizing anger. This effect is not due to shared evaluative or stereotypic associations between beardedness and negativity, as beards did not facilitate recognition of positive expressions (happiness) or of another negative expression, sadness, and beards increased rated prosociality of happy faces but also masculinity and aggressiveness of angry faces. Bearded faces are also detected faster in crowds than clean-shaven faces and the presence of a beard increases the magnitude of the search advantage for angry faces in crowds (anger superiority effect). Results suggest that beards may alter perceived facial structure, facilitating rapid judgments of threat on bearded men. Findings so far suggest that men’s facial hair impacts nonverbal communication and could influence social interactions beyond the lab and into men’s daily lives. This makes beards an interesting domain for further research.
BIO: Belinda Craig is currently a lecturer at the University of New England. Prior to this, she completed her PhD at The University of Queensland (2015) and a postdoc at Curtin University in Perth. She is interested in the areas of emotion and person perception. Most of her work investigates how we perceive information from the face and body (e.g., race, sex, age, emotion, eye-gaze, facial hair) and how this social information influences other cognitive processes like memory and attention.
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