“Facial mimicry certainly plays some role, and perhaps a key role, in understanding other people’s emotional states,” Dr. Kevin Ochsner

When you're smiling, the whole world smiles with you

Contagious smiling (and frowning and scowling and so on) is the basis of reading others' emotions and registering how you should, in turn, feel.

We tend to mimic the smiles or frowns of others because it helps us better understand what other people are feeling, allowing us to respond appropriately.

Evidence shows that an instinct for facial mimicry allows us to empathize with and even experience other people's feelings.

A person's ability to recognize and "share" others' emotions can be inhibited when they can't mimic faces, even from something as simple as long-term pacifier use.

you mimic their expression unconsciously, which then tells your brain what to feel. All this happens in a few hundred milliseconds.

We are unconsciously learning things by what we see and that's why infants mimic their parents behavior. When they smile to them, they smile back.

Each time you smile, you throw a little feel-good party in your brain. The act of smiling activates neural messaging that benefits your health and happiness.

smiling activates the release of neuropeptides that work toward fighting off stress.

the serotonin release brought on by your smile serves as an anti-depressant/mood lifter.

when you view a person smiling, you actually feel rewarded.

When you smile,you are creating a symbiotic relationship that allows both of you to release feel-good chemicals in your brain, activate reward centers, make you both more attractive, and increase the chances of you both living longer, healthier lives.

First stage: You see an expressive face You need to know what the expression means so you can react effectively.

Second stage: You simulate the facial expression Simulation uses the same areas of your brain that cause your facial expressions- it may therefore cause you to mimic the expression.

Third stage: The simulation tells you how it feels to make that expression The context or your knowledge about the expresser may have an influence.

This quick, automatic, and unconscious process allows you to connect the subtle emotion signals of others to your own emotion experiences.

Smiling makes us happier Smiling triggers a reduction in stress-enhancing hormones and increases the production of mood-enhancing hormones.

Even forcing a “fake” smile when you’re not truly feeling it has been shown to reduce stress and result in more positive feelings.

Genuine smiles might help people see eye-to-eye during interactions. People who often make genuine smiles may have an easier time convincing others to adopt their goals.

The world is simply a better place when you smile.

What I want to give in the theatre is beauty, that's what I want to give.

Hi-Tek is on three or four songs on the new record.

I've never made a film using dialogue or speech.

I'm not pro-business. I'm pro-free enterprise.

I'm not sure I am a politician. I would say that I am still an artist, and I'm trying to use politics as an instrument for change.

As a youngster, I think I said I wanted to be a journalist, but that's a disguise for being a writer.

In high school, I worked at Abercrombie & Fitch, and once I graduated from business school at USC, I started a company with my partner and had a nine-to-seven job.

Does the imam have a legal right to build the mosque at Ground Zero? The answer is yes. But is it the right thing to do? The answer is no. And most Americans, and most moderate Muslims, join with me in that call.

I have great respect for Sandra Day O'Connor. She has broken so many barriers for women in the law, and was a master negotiator and pragmatist in her days on the Supreme Court.

Sometimes, with directors, you have to take what they say and translate it in your head, into something that makes sense to you, because you're speaking two different languages.

When I do get time, I like to hike and I take lots of vitamins and powders to keep healthy.

When life puts you in tough situations, don't say "Why me" say "Try me".

The great power the president has is that he is the most prominent person in the biggest media event on the planet. He has the attention of the nation and the world. When he speaks, everybody listens.

A woman with a voice is by definition a strong woman.

It's a problem sometimes when you speak to journalists. They quote you, and then they read what they wrote, and then they even explain it. It's dangerous.

When you're younger, being a redhead is... Well, my two brothers teased me no end.

More and more, in any company, managers are dealing with different cultures. Companies are going global, but the teams are being divided and scattered all over the planet.

I went to drama school for three years, and the whole thing there is that hopefully you are introduced to a man called William Shakespeare who is the greatest of all time of all storytelling.

I'm a girl that will suffer for fashion.

Cinema is an old whore, like circus and variety, who knows how to give many kinds of pleasure. Besides, you can't teach old fleas new dogs.

I'll always be sad that my marriage ended.

A critic should be taught to criticise a work of art without making any reference to the personality of the author.

I worry about the very pernicious way we elevate and separate ourselves from other beasts, the way we rationalize our comfort and ease, our worship of the self, as healthy. It's enticing, but with a terrible taint of evil.

Confidence is that feeling by which the mind embarks in great and honorable courses with a sure hope and trust in itself.