Gait gives away your emotions - study reveals

Researchers conducted an experiment in which people watched simplified motion videos, but instead of a person, just a few dots representing joints.

Despite this, participants confidently identified emotions:

• joy
• anger
• fear
• sadness

And did better than random guessing.

Details

Turns out it's all about one key parameter

the range and rhythm of motion of the arms and legs

When movements are:

• wide, active → more likely to be perceived as confidence or anger
• restrained, "compressed" → associated with fear or sadness

The scientists were even able to artificially change this parameter - and people kept guessing emotions correctly.

"Even a single type of movement can directly influence how we recognise emotions," the study authors note.

Why it matters

It used to be thought that what was important for recognising emotion was:

• facial expressions
• voice
• facial expression

But now it's becoming clear that the body also "speaks" - and sometimes quite accurately.

These results can be used

• in animation and video games (to make movements look more realistic)
• in robotics - to recognise human emotions
• in psychology and behavioural research.

Even without words and facial expressions, people are able to understand each other's emotions - just by their gait. And sometimes a single movement is enough to give away your mood.

Source

Royal Society Open Science