Paul Ekman has been building a database of how the face moves for every
emotion. The face can make 43 distinct muscle movements; Ekman calls
them 'action units'. These can be combined into more than 10,000
visible facial configurations, some of which are nonsense faces, the
rest of which express known emotions. Each of these thousands of
movements is so rapid that all of them could be expressed in a couple of
hours.
Ekman has been attempting to write out a pattern of facial muscular
movement to represent each emotion. Fear, for example, uses the 'action
units' of the inner brow raiser, the outer brow raiser, the brow
lowering (depressor supercilli), all at the same time. Ekman catalogued
these combinations into the 'facial action coding system'---a system
that, he claims, can be used to read a person's thoughts via their
face. Police authorities around the world are already seeking this help
interpreting even the tiniest 'micro-expressions' to detect if someone
is lying.
But although codification of expression is possible, it can't
necessarily be reproduced. One of the important markers of an emotion is
that it starts prior to consciousness, says Ekman. 'Decisions and
evaluations happen in our brain so quickly that we don't know we're
having an emotion until it has started happening. We can't decide to be
happy or sad; it simply happens to us.'
Surprisingly, the most difficult expression to conjure up is the smile.
According to Ekman, a smile isn't only about flexing the lips but
tightening the tiny muscles that orbit the eye. These are more difficult
to control, and few people can achieve it.
1. Which **TWO** of the following views does Ekman hold?
请选择 2 个答案
A. There are 10,000 configurations of the face that express emotions.
B. Emotions are expressed in more than one part of the face.
C. People can learn to conceal their thoughts.
D. It is important to research the areas of the brain involved in
E. Certain facial movements are harder to make consciously than others.