Dr. David Matsumoto Unlock's The Secret to 95% of Communication

Unlock the Secrets to 95% of Communication with Dr. David Matsumoto
Ever wondered how much of what we say is actually *not* said? Join us as relationship expert Kimberly Beam Holmes dives deep into the fascinating world of nonverbal communication with renowned psychologist Dr. David Matsumoto.

In this eye-opening conversation, they uncover the power of facial expressions, micro-expressions, and body language in building attraction, trust, and deeper connections. Discover how to navigate complex emotions like anger and contempt in your relationships, and learn the surprising truth about empathy across cultures.

Who is this for?
- Anyone curious about the hidden language of emotions and relationships.
- Those seeking to improve their communication skills and understanding of others.
- Individuals interested in the science behind attraction and connection.
- Professionals looking to enhance their ability to read and interpret nonverbal cues.
- Couples wanting to deepen their understanding of each other and resolve conflict effectively.

Don't miss this opportunity to gain valuable insights into the often-overlooked aspects of communication that can transform your personal and professional relationships.

Today’s Speaker - Dr. David Matsumoto

Dr. David Matsumoto, Director of Humintell, is a renowned expert in the field of microexpressions, facial expression, gesture, nonverbal behavior, emotion and culture. He has published over 400+ articles, manuscripts, book chapters and books on these subjects.

Since 1989 Matsumoto has been a Professor of Psychology at San Francisco State University. He is also the founder and director of SFSU’s Culture and Emotion Research Laboratory. The laboratory focuses on studies involving culture, emotion, social interaction and communication.  

In 2009, Matsumoto was one of the select few to receive the prestigious Minerva Grant; a $1.9 million grant from the US Department of Defense to examine the role of emotions in ideologically-based groups. 

Matsumoto first began studying psychology at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, where he received his Bachelors Degree. He obtained his Masters and Doctorate Degrees in Psychology from the University of California at Berkeley.

Website:
https://www.humintell.com

 

🔗 Website: https://itstartswithattraction.com
📱 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kimberlybeamholmes
👀 TikTok

Your Host: Kimberly Beam Holmes, Expert in Self-Improvement and Relationships


Kimberly Beam Holmes has applied her master's degree in psychology for over ten years, acting as the CEO of Marriage Helper & CEO and Creator of PIES University, being a wife and mother herself, and researching how attraction affects relationships. Her videos, podcasts, and following reach over 500,000 people a month who are making changes and becoming the best they can be.

🔗 Website: https://itstartswithattraction.com
📱 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kimberlybeamholmes
👀 TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@kimberlybeamholmes

Follow our other channels!
📺 https://youtube.com/@UC7gCCAhhQvD3MBpKpI_4g6w
📺 https://youtube.com/@UCEOibktrLPG4ufxidR8I4UQ

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Welcome to. It Starts With Attraction. My name is Jason, I'm the producer of the podcast, and today we are re-airing an episode that premiered on September 1st 2020. And it's with Dr David Matsumoto. It's an episode that we all love here. It's an episode that Kimberly references a ton, and we really want to make sure that everybody can hear it. So, without further ado, let's dive into today's episode.

Speaker 2: 0:21

Did you know that there are seven universal emotions? I was completely blown away when I was speaking with our guests today Dr Matsumoto, who is a psychologist who has studied micro expressions, human behaviors and emotions and so many other fascinating things. I loved my conversation with him and we went so deep in areas that I honestly wasn't even expecting At first. I thought this podcast was going to be all about how we can notice our own facial expressions when we are speaking with other people and what we need to be mindful of to have better conversations with others. But, friends, we went so much deeper and so much more impactful in the episode today than just that.

Speaker 2: 1:13

Dr David Matsumoto is a psychologist who has focused on microexpressions, body language, the way that humans interact with each other, for several decades. In addition to working with the government, he has also worked with universities and he has many published scholarly articles, which, for those of you who understand PhDs and all of the work that goes into that, it's a huge deal. But even more than that, he's genuine and real. He's not just talking about science and all of this high level stuff. The whole time he applies it to daily life, and I had an amazing conversation with him, I had huge key takeaways that I can't wait to share with you at the end of this episode Because, honestly, this man is as wise as he is smart. So I want to know what got you into studying all of these fascinating areas that you've studied with micro expressions, gestures, nonverbal behavior. What led you to, what led you into that?

Speaker 3: 2:30

I think if I tell you what, what led me into to studying nonverbal behavior, facial expressions, micros and all that other stuff, um, you might be disappointed and your listeners might be disappointed as well, because it's not a very attractive, attractive thing I gotta tell you. You know, I it has to do with my, my dull, boring personality. I just I just start something and you know, I just need to keep doing it where I, that's what I do. I just keep, I keep my, my proverbial nose to the grindstone. And, um, it all started way back when, when I was an undergraduate at the university of michigan which is a cold place, by the way, because I'm originally from Hawaii, oh, very warm, yeah. And I was going through my undergraduate career there in psychology when a professor came to me and said would you like to be part of the honors program? And I said, of course I would. What do I need to do? I didn't even know that it existed, by the way. And he said well, you got to find an advisor and do a study. I said, great, what's that? And he said well, you know, there's a process why you do research and all that stuff. What are you interested in? And he asked me and I had no clue. But I, you know, ever since I was a kid I was interested in why children, especially young infants, know what their caretakers, especially their mothers, are saying without knowing the words, because infants are very attuned to their moms, right, and other people. But I've always been interested in that. And so he said oh, you got to go talk to that guy over there whose name is Bob Zients. He happened to be a very, very famous psychologist. Again, I didn't know this Walked into his office, I said to him what I was interested in.

Speaker 3: 4:21

He said oh well, why don't you do this and this and that and the other thing? So I'll make a long story short. So then I did it. I did a study on that topic, on how preschoolers understood the emotional content in their language without words, and it was really cool. And then also I happen to be I do judo right. So I don't know if you've seen my bio. I've done judo for 54 of my 61 years here on earth.

Speaker 3: 4:46

And I happened to be going to Japan for training in between those summers of my junior and senior year. So my advisor said, hey, go collect data there. I said, okay, fine, I'll do that. So then I did a cross-cultural study on that topic, you know. And then I, just because that's what I did and because of my personality, I just kept doing more things like that.

Speaker 3: 5:09

And, lo and behold, here we are. I mean, that was in 1970, 1979. And here we are 40 years later, right, is that? Right? Yeah, 40 years later, and I've just been doing the same thing. I just been kept doing research on it and kept learning about it, and kept learning about it and kept doing things, because really that's what I did. And when I started out in this, I had no premonition or motivation that that's what I'm going to do for my life, even though I'm of Japanese ancestry. I didn't have any thought about doing cross-cultural research. I thought I was going to be a psychologist, like like Bob Newhart in the seventies, and uh, yeah, anyway. So, so, uh, that didn't happen either, but, um, but I just kept doing it. And here I am, here we are. I just know, know a lot about it because I just kept doing it.

Speaker 2: 6:03

Well, so in the, in the studies that you did in undergrad, where you were looking at why or how children understand their parents, what did you learn from?

Speaker 3: 6:14

them. I learned that, as I thought, the preschoolers as young as three years old could understand specific emotions in language when there's no words available. I mean they were. They were given stimulant like abcdefg, but said angrily or said fearfully, or said happily, and they detected what emotions were being portrayed in those voices even though there's no words in them. So that was pretty interesting. And also that there are no cross-cultural differences between the american and japanese kids and these are preschoolers at three, four or five years of age, which is kind of cool when you think about that.

Speaker 3: 6:52

So then you think about okay, where does that come from? Why is it like that? And and um, because that was my undergraduate year and I was, I was moving to, uh, to. I came here to, here to California for grad school and my undergraduate advisor said well, if you want to continue that topic, you know you should look up this other guy over there in San Francisco. I said okay, and of course, because of my personality, that's what I did, and he connected me with Paul Ekman, who was another very famous psychologist who studied faces. And so Ekman suggested to me oh well, you got to read all this stuff about faces. I said okay, because I do what I'm told and that's what I did. I started reading about faces, started doing research on faces and ever since then I've been primarily. I was primarily in the face for the first 10 or 20 years and then recently more branched out into voice, gesture, you know, act, words and other kinds of things, aspects of behavior, hmm.

Speaker 2: 7:52

That is really fascinating and it is true. So both of my kids are adopted from India. We brought them home a year and a half ago now and our the oldest daughter at that time was four and our son was two. They spoke a completely different language, did not know English, clearly, I did not know Marathi, but we and people told me this before we brought them home. They said you will, you will be able to communicate with them even though they don't know English. And I was like we'll see how this works. But exactly what you're saying I mean there was inflections of what they would say or what I would say and we did. And it is really fascinating because if you stop to really think about it, it's like that shouldn't make sense, but it works and it does, and it's amazing.

Speaker 3: 8:40

Yeah, well, actually. Um, yeah, you, you raised so many great points. I mean, kids are amazing at picking that stuff up, you know, when you're talking about different languages, however, when people are fluent in a different language, you can hear the emotional tones in the inflections and the pitch and the intensity of the voice, et cetera, et cetera, but one has to kind of filter out the natural use of the vocalics in the language, right? And so once you filter that out, yes, it becomes very, very clear what's going on. And then, on top of that, as you know in your own experiences as well, which is related to your, I think, your topic, which is, you know, we communicate so much in non-verbally.

Speaker 3: 9:26

Of course, saying words like I love you or I have a problem with this in a relationship is very important, of course, but we also say those kinds of messages, and even in more nuanced ways, non-verbally, for example, through our facial expressions, and our facial expressions of emotions are universal.

Speaker 3: 9:46

So, even without the language, you could communicate with your children from India, as everybody around the world can communicate through faces. We have the same aspects of universal expression and recognition of emotions in our voices, but then we go so much more with the nonverbals right. There's so much, so much to be said about, um, talking to somebody and like your kids or your partner, um, with a little soft inflection in your voice, speaking softly, a little touch goes a long way. Sometimes all of that is non-verbal, right, and so, um, there's a lot of nonverbal messages, I think, that can overcome language differences. And when language is not a difference, when languages are not different, they then do a lot to supplement, complement, qualify the language and all of that stuff occurs normally. Of course, we learn about that in on-the-job training in our lives, but when you really think about it, those kinds of behaviors play a huge role in communication.

Speaker 2: 10:53

So define for me and for the audience what a micro-expression is.

Speaker 3: 11:00

All righty. So a micro-expression is a special case of normally occurring facial expressions of emotion. A micro expression is a very quick, very rapid, unconscious, spontaneous facial expression of emotion that lasts generally under half a second. Most people can't see them and those who see them see something but don't know really what it. They don't interpret it or can't interpret it very well. There are signs of unconscious, repressed or suppressed emotions and feelings and there's always a thought associated with the emotion and feeling. Right, let me contrast that with normal or what I call macro facial expressions.

Speaker 3: 11:46

Macro expressions are the normal expressions that we have in normal everyday discourse where, if we don't try to suppress our expressions, macro expressions last on our faces between a half second to four or five seconds, which is a long time. You know and we can. We learn to read macro expressions in our normal everyday lives very well. They're part of our evolutionary history and, as I said, they play a huge role in communication. Micro expressions are signs of concealed or repressed emotions. They're occurring because in times when we are very emotional but we're trying to really control how we're presenting ourselves and in those cases we've got this conflict in our mind going on. Where I'm emotional, I want to express, but then another part of our mind is saying, okay, control what you're doing. And then that situation or context allows for micro expressions to what we call leak out. And so they leak out. They're very quick, spontaneous facial expressions of emotion.

Speaker 2: 12:58

Hmm, so would I be more likely to show micro expressions only when other people are around, or is it still something I might do in private?

Speaker 3: 13:08

Yes, you're more likely to do it when people are around, because other people being around is a great, is a big context issue, right, and that produces a lot of what's called social or social or self-regulation, or social or self-regulation. And so, yes, when more people around, that's more likely. Yes, the more stakes that are involved in our discussion, the more likely. Yes, the more I'm worried about your impression of me, the more likely. But having been said now, I mean, even when we're alone, people live in our heads, right, and so it's not that there's zero possibility of micro expression, because, because they're, because we self-regulate our behavior any way, regardless of whether people are around, because we've all learned to self-regulate and internalize others, right, as social beings. I mean, we're social, social animals and so that's what we do. But, relation to your question, yes, it's more likely in those kinds of situations that I mentioned.

Speaker 2: 14:09

So, if, if I may not even be aware of the micro expressions that are happening, and I think you you said this, but I want to ask it again so is it really too quick for other people to notice any micro expressions that I have, or do they? You said that it was so quick that they couldn't, they might not be able to process it, Right? Does it make them pause and think, or is it so quick that the other person really doesn't? It doesn't, it doesn't affect communication between two people.

Speaker 3: 14:41

Well, that's a really great question.

Speaker 3: 14:42

I mean, I do think that on some level, we are unconsciously very many people unconsciously process those things, but not knowing exactly what they are.

Speaker 3: 14:51

I believe that a lot of that unconscious processing just ignores it as noise, right, and because we have a bias to focus on words, and so we then focus on the we, then we, because once you're in that mode, you're you're doing what we call systematic deliberation, right, I'm trying to think through what you're saying, what I, what you're saying, what I saw, what I want to say, etc. Etc. And we're talking about perceptions of things that are lasting, like that, right, a tenth of a second, and so, um, yeah, I think that that the mind registers are at some place, but I think most times we just go on without thinking about it. And that's really an interesting thing, right, because if we knew or had greater recognition of those things that you know, you know we're getting greater insights about the other person's mind and that there are many that there may be other kinds of thoughts and feelings about stuff that may be relevant to what we're talking about.

Speaker 3: 15:49

Of course in Pandora's box, right? Because they don't know they're giving it to us. Now I'm thinking through about things that they don't know that they're giving to us, and so there's a Pandora's box there. You just never know where that's going to go. So, with regard to microexpressions, it's a pretty tricky situation if one wants to delve into those things, you know. Hmm.

Speaker 2: 16:11

So let's talk about macro expressions then for a minute. They last longer, people are more likely to see them. So, but what you just said is we're more likely to think about or focus on the words someone is saying. But what tells us more? The words or the facial expressions?

Speaker 3: 16:28

the macros, I tell you I can summarize decades of research for you. There's actually been many, many studies over the last four or five decades that have compared the relative contributions of verbal words and nonverbal behavior in overall message exchange and communication. And so when the content of the words and the content of the nonverbals match each other, it kind of doesn't matter People, if you believe the words, you're going to get the message anyway. Right? But interestingly, when the content of the words do not match the content of the nonverbal behaviors, more messages are exchanged and then interpreted nonverbally. And then, depending upon the study, that contribution of the nonverbals is between 65 and 95% of the overall messages in the communication. Yeah, so it's huge. Um, so what that? So, for example, if somebody's saying something positive in their words and and wrinkling their nose and discuss while they tell you, or shaking their head or shrugging while they say it, you know that gives a different appearance.

Speaker 3: 17:47

What I'm talking about is what I call the total communication package. When we're in interaction with anybody, we have a total communication package, unless you're, you know, a geek scientist like me. You know most people don't parse it all out. Right. There's nonverbal, there's face, there's words. You know we're just learning all this stuff, but someplace in our minds a lot of people's minds we're catching that information. But then, once we catch it, what do we do with it? It's a question, right? Then I think people oftentimes go back to okay, let's focus on what you said. And sometimes, if there's other interesting information in the nonverbals, we might miss something, right and so. But again, it's a Pandora's box. You know you got to watch out for how that goes. But that's the relative contributions between verbal and nonverbal.

Speaker 2: 18:36

Yeah, and I can totally see that. If so, the example that came to mind as you were talking is when people sense that another person's lying. So they're saying one thing. They're saying, they're telling me the truth, but they're not looking me in the eye, they're pausing, they're looking away. So in those instances, you know it, does we? We really do focus more on what they're not saying and what they're saying. But how so? If well, let me ask this question Are nonverbal behaviors, I'm sure, are a mixture of learned and or no? Are they all learned? Do we learn all of them from someone else?

Speaker 3: 19:21

No, no, no, no. So that's a very interesting thing, right? I mean, some aspects of our nonverbal behavior are biologically innate to us and universal to everybody. So, for example, certain facial expressions of emotion are biologically innate. We have everybody in the world, whether you're from the United States or Indiaia, or japan or pakistan or anywhere, wherever, everybody has the same facial expressions of emotion. Um, when they're emotional, everybody um uses the, the voice, the inflections of the voice and the parallel, what we call paralinguistic cues, to express those same emotions in similar ways.

Speaker 3: 20:03

There there are cultural differences, however, a lot of cultural differences, and thus learned behavior.

Speaker 3: 20:09

So, while the capacity to have the expressions, emotions, expressions is innate, everybody and every culture learns different ways of how to then manage that capacity, and so we call them rules, just like, and we have different ways of managing our voice and our gestures, and so our gestures are very culture specific, for example. So, and there's many different types of gestures, there's gestures that have verbal meaning, like this, which, since we're audio, your audience probably won't see that, but I'm doing a thumbs up and that corner has a thumb, um, uh, you know cross-culturally similar meanings, but things like this, which is the peace sign for us is very culturally different, right, and so there are many of those, and so there's cultural differences. There's there's cultural differences in many non-verbals, but, and then there's universal aspects to some, and that's the the other part, right. Parsing all of that out, when you're observing behavior and interpreting what's going on, it becomes the, the difficult, more complex thing right, yeah, because even in india that you know, shaking your head, yes, for them it's the side to side movement.

Speaker 2: 21:22

Every everywhere is a little bit different. So what, from all the research you've done all the years you've been in the field, what do you believe are the most important parts of this? Whether it's facial nonverbals, all of those when it comes to communicating with other people, should we be aware of ourselves, should we be more aware of other people, or is this just something that happens and it's it's cool to know about, but does it have direct application to us?

Speaker 3: 21:55

Oh well, boy, that's a tough question because, um I, the answer to that question depends upon who you're. For me, depends upon who you're communicating with. So, for example, if I answer that question in relationship to people with whom I want to have a loving, trusting relationship, I have a certain answer. If you're talking about you know, you're going grocery shopping you're communicating with the clerk at the register, I have a different answer, and so I think it really depends, to tell you the truth. I mean, it depends upon the context, and context includes the people with whom we're interacting. If I limit it to people who I think we want to have, good, I'm doing the quotes in the air for everybody, the good, great relationships, loving, trusting relationships, whether it's friends or partners or you know what I mean family.

Speaker 3: 22:52

Um, I tell you what's what I think the most important thing is not not the non-verbal, it's, it's the, the attitude and the intent in the mind that produces the non-verbals, because the non-verbals, to me, are external expressions of mental states and I think that it's very difficult to start thinking about in that context. Now, oh, let's do this with our non-verbals If it doesn't match the mind, if you don't have the intent, for example, to be something it's hard to force it. You can force it, but then it's forced. I think in those kinds of situations. I've been thinking about this. I think about this actually for many different contexts, but ever since we scheduled this I've been thinking about this question in this way. Excuse me.

Speaker 3: 23:45

I think it comes down to genuineness being genuine In terms of open and expressive about one's thoughts and feelings, what's in the content of the mind. Because once one is genuine now I'm going to link it back to the non-verbals Once one is genuine, then the content of the words and the content of my non-verbals start matching each other better, and that then gives. There's a lot of research that shows that observers then take that and and make more um, uh, there's a greater impression of genuineness, honesty, trustworthiness, where which I think are basic building block foundations of those kinds of relationships. And I think non nonverbals then are expressions as, along with the words. Now, the words and the nonverbals are then expressions of the, of that, that frame of mind, and I think it starts there. To tell you the truth, um, I think it was a different relationship.

Speaker 3: 24:50

I'd say I'd have a different answer. I mean, if I'm at the clerk at the shop or I, you know, I, I'm, I'm in a restaurant, when you can go to restaurants and you know you, you got something in the food, or I mean I don't. You, you know, there's more regulation, you, there's more. It's more strategic about that stuff, because you have a goal about what you want to get and thus you need to be more strategic. I think we're all strategic in those situations, but when it comes down to those kinds of relationships and then your question, I think it comes down to the attitude. First, it's about genuineness, it's about honesty, and then the words and the nonverbals then are flowing from that. Yeah, that's what I'm saying.

Speaker 3: 25:31

I mean, research-wise, I can tell you that we and many people have parsed out okay, what's the relative contributions? Where is the most of the messages coming from? Face or voice or gestures? And I'll tell you, the biggest contribution is face. Of the nonverbals, face is the biggest right. The others are also important, but the face is the largest. And then there's gestures, and then there's voice and there's other kinds of things where we can scale that stuff. But in everyday life, while we're talking with each other, I might, but most people are not going to scale the verbal and nonverbal that they're engaging with. Most of us have created an impression where I can trust what this person is saying or not, trust what this person is saying or not, and that stuff, that stuff of genuineness and honesty and trustworthiness, is, I think, some of the most important building blocks that are signaled by the nonverbal. So I took a long way to kind of answer your question, but I hope I'm kind of getting to.

Speaker 2: 26:33

I love it.

Speaker 3: 26:34

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 26:35

I love it and I I would agree with that. So the question that that made me think of was so if there is someone who's really angry about something and for them their genuine response, for it to match their nonverbals it you know they wouldn't regulate it for it to match they might end up saying things that are are hurtful, and all that because they're not regulating. So in a situation like that, would it still like how would you do?

Speaker 3: 27:07

how would that work in a situation where someone's angry yeah, as an example, yeah, great, I mean, first of all, I, I, I want to believe that pure raw anger will not exist, or hopefully, in most people. I think, if you're in a relationship with somebody and again, it doesn't have to be a partner, right, it could be a friend, a family member Pure raw anger without anything else is probably hard to find. It exists, probably hard to find. I think people can have, do have intense anger, but somewhere their mind is caring, loving this history that we've had, and and a thought of how can I, how can I express this in a way that is constructive, right? So that's all I mean. At any one point in time, we've got multiple parts in our mind. What I'm saying is, if you've got those parts in your head, you know, let them come out. Um, if we have only pure emotion, whatever that, whatever it is, there's another issue there. It's, it's one of we need to. We should learn how to regulate our emotions a little better. And that's an intra-personal, that's an intra-personal thing, it's for that person. And thus then there's the derivative products of that for relationships, right, when you're already in a relationship and and you know you, you know you like a lot.

Speaker 3: 28:32

Okay, listen, let me talk about my kids. I, I've got you you mentioned your kids. I've got four children a daughter and three boys and a grandson Wonderful, yeah, and no one. Because this is audio. Nobody saw that when I said I had four kids, they saw me saying that with a neutral, straight face. But then when I said hey, I got a grandson, I had that big smile going on, you know.

Speaker 2: 28:56

I noticed it. I didn't notice it going on, you know, I noticed it, I didn't notice it.

Speaker 3: 28:58

But you know so. Then three of them were boys right and I have twins that are 20 and one who's 18. Boys, and you know, boys are boys right and sometimes I just want to knock them, you know no question about it.

Speaker 3: 29:16

By the way, we all do judoo, so sometimes I do knock them down, but you know that's a we're gonna, we're gonna special like that. But you know, even then you're not gonna have pure on a, on a unfiltered, unadulterated anger going on other. I mean that's crazy, right, because someplace in your mind you're a parent. You may not like the thing they did right there, but they're your kid. And then, going on that, there's mom right there and mom loves their kid and I love my, I love their mom and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I mean there's multiple things going on in your mind. So it's even no matter how many times you you know they do something stupid, which is it's been about 30 minutes now, so they're they're gonna have to, they're gonna do something stupid soon. But you know I I mean I've already missed six of them because we're never mind. Never mind you know what I'm trying to say that we have that, we have all kinds of things in our mind and and what I'm trying to say is be genuine about how to do that. Don't suppress it all. Don't be engaged, enraged at all. Be genuine about how you're coming up. I think oftentimes, I think being genuine about what it is that we're angry about is really important, right, because you raise it. It's interesting, you picked that particular emotion here. I'm just rambling on here, but I love it. Anger is all about. Well, let me step back, for every one of these universal emotions and anger is one of them there's a universal psychological trigger of it, all around the world. It's the same thing. It's the same thing whether in the or the united states. It's goal obstruction. It's goal. There's a lot of research that I can talk to about this, but it's goal obstruction. It's there. There's a lot of research that I can talk to about this, but it's goal obstruction. Thus, now, what is the goal? How is it obstructed? Okay, now that's where you come in and that's your learning and your history and why is that important to you? And blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Right, but it's goal obstruction.

Speaker 3: 31:12

When people are angry at another person, think about this now. Most of the time, it's angry about an act or a behavior or something. What we do with anger is that we then direct it to the person who did it, but in actuality, the action is what is the obstruction? Right? And so if we had a better way of thinking through these things, we wouldn't be so angry at the person, although that's kind of what we do, we. We focus on the act, yeah, if we could.

Speaker 3: 31:49

So then, going back to my kids, I, I, you know you think about, okay, what is it that? Really, I'm sorry, pissed you off, and it's like it's not him, how much I want to say, I think it's him, it's that act. And thus when you start thinking, this too is hey, sit down, let's talk about what you just did there, not the kind of person you are, not, not demonizing who you are. It it's not your self-worth, it's about that particular behavior. And let me explain to you why that one doesn't fly with me.

Speaker 3: 32:24

So that's why I'm talking about being genuine, about no thoughts, no sense, hiding those back, no sense. I mean because now we can communicate right, but once you direct it to the person, now all bets are off, because now, once people do that, now they're defending themselves and not and now we're not talking about the act, we're defending ourselves. And then it's a very special emotion because once you it flies one way, it'll fly back the other way really fast. And so, like you probably notice, I mean people are, when people are get into an argument, they go boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom really fast 10 cycles later, which takes about 30 seconds, they're arguing about arguing and not about what he started, and this is why, and so I don't know how we got on this topic, but but that's how that's. I'm talking about not just unadulterated anger. It's just think these things through and then then you'd be genuine about what you want to try to communicate.

Speaker 2: 33:24

So what are some of these other universal emotions?

Speaker 3: 33:27

See, that's a good topic, right. Anger is all about instruction. It's not necessarily about the person. Disgust is another universal emotion which is in our. I mean, all emotions are universal. The ones with universal facial expressions are anger, contempt, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness and surprise. Anger, blood, goal obstruction. Disgust is about contamination, contaminated objects right there's, just think about something smells fishy and you got the nose wrinkle going on there. Yeah, fear is about threat, threat, threat to the self. It could be psychological self, my self-worth, or my physical self. This is about loss. I lost something that's very important to me. Surprises about novel objects oh I didn't know that. Uh, happiness is is about novel objects. Oh, I didn't know that. Happiness is about goal attainment, and the one that I left for the end.

Speaker 3: 34:24

Contempt is about moral superiority, that something or someone is beneath you. So contempt is a little different than the other six because contempt has that kind of interpersonal judgment in it. And, by the way, I'm sure you know I read a little bit about you and your family's research history and whatnot. I'm sure you know about the research by John Gottman and Bob Levinson. I mean, they're friends of mine and what little known one part of their research which I really love, because I'm in the nonverbal emotion world is that some of these emotions that I just mentioned can signal the quality of the relationship right, and the particularly dangerous ones are contempt and disgust. And what I understand from their research and I've been a fan of their research for decades is that and I'm summarizing right it's not the relationship quality and satisfaction in the future is not as much about being happy all the time, of course being happy is great, right, it's about whether people have a way, or couples have a way, of resolving conflict productive. And that seems to be, as far as I understand from their studies, a big predictor of relationship quality, relationship success, future relationship existing. You know, and I I totally believe it, because everything is for any relationship right, doesn't matter whether you're a couple or not. Things are good, everybody's good.

Speaker 3: 35:59

The thing about being together for a while is is can you work out the inevitable conflicts that occur in everyday life? And so, um, you know when, when, when, he studied people who are there arguing with each other about something, if there was more contempt and disgust in the expressions and the words and the behavior, that did not bode well for the future. But you see, that didn't include anger. Anger as I say. Anger is about the goal. Right, people can express anger. You can deal with the action. But once you talk about contempt and disgust because those emotions can be interpersonal that becomes about the other person and those become more difficult to deal with.

Speaker 2: 36:40

I think right, because if you talk about gotman's, the four horsemen, right, contempt is one of them, and then so much of it. It says when contempt is present in a relationship, then the person who's feeling like the contempt is towards them are going to have higher levels of of illness, like it literally breaks them down as a human being. And it's yeah, it's, I believe he says, the worst of the four.

Speaker 3: 37:11

Yeah, of course.

Speaker 2: 37:13

So how do you undo that?

Speaker 3: 37:18

Undoing contempt is, I think, a tough thing. I mean, I think contempt and disgust and some of its derivatives are probably the keys to breakups of relationships, whether they're interpersonal relationships or intergroup relationships, because I can spend a long time talking about our research on intergroup issues as well, um, and involving these emotions. But how do, how to fix that is is tough, I think you know, um, and if I had the, the successful answer to that, I probably wouldn't be doing what I'm doing right now. But but I have to think that it starts with understanding. There's probably multiple issues. It starts with understanding the fact that one is on a moral perch, one is contemptuous, right, and understanding the hurt and harm it can cause to others and also for others the recipient, who you were talking about to be able to express that harm and hurt and to level the playing field. I mean, contempt is about hierarchy. So there's hierarchy in the mind right, I'm better than you, or you're better than you're saying you're better than me. You know what I mean. There's a lot of hierarchy and leveling the playing field, I think, is probably a high-level goal of that.

Speaker 3: 38:52

Now, how do you do that, right? You know, I can see many situations where it actually works well, which is decision making right, where everybody is more egalitarian about decision making. See, I, that's another thing. I mean, here's another tangent, I I think it's really interesting where a lot of society focuses on what people are doing, especially between men and women, right, what people are doing, especially between men and women, right, what people are doing, and using what people are doing as the metric for inequality, as opposed to the decision-making about what people are doing.

Speaker 3: 39:25

Because I think people being equal partners in decision-making is a good leveling the field kind of thing. And if we have equal power and say what we're both going to do and then we just do that and we're true to that, I mean we're now equal partners about that, right? So I think on a high level, it's leveling the playing field in terms of especially about decision making and an expression of one's feelings about stuff. And an expression of one's feelings about stuff, because in hierarchical relationships I think what is happening is that one person can express, but the other one cannot without being judged, and so it's that non-judgmental listening that would also level playing fields.

Speaker 2: 40:13

And it's tough.

Speaker 3: 40:18

I mean, it's easy to come up with these high level guiding principles but you know, when people are like that or in that moment even it's hard to get off that. I mean it's it's a tough emotion to deal with when you've studied this with groups.

Speaker 2: 40:29

So has that been in terms of like a corporation or in terms of like culture or race? So what? What does that look like?

Speaker 3: 40:37

Yeah, I've studied it in all of those contexts, but most of our studies have been in understanding violence between ideologically motivated groups, so terrorism, for example, and other kinds of group violence like that. It's really interesting because contempt and disgust is the fuel of those things, as it is for interpersonal relationships. So, and you know, when you think about the group situation, boy once, once you're on that contempt and disgust trajectory, it's hard to get off when you, when it's a group as it, it's more, it's magnified more than the interpersonal one. The interpersonal one is tough as well, as you know.

Speaker 2: 41:26

But with a group you have multiple people feeding it over and over, and so just one person breaking loose of it might be might be good for that if they're able to actually break free, but if they can't, you're not going to escape that thing, yeah it's tough.

Speaker 3: 41:35

I mean if you've got because with groups you've got all kinds of other factors right, you've got leaders who may or may not be expressing that, you've got influencers within groups who are influencing that stuff. You may have media that's fanning that stuff and propaganda, other kinds of propaganda. Some groups have incentives, you know incentive structures to to continue that stuff, and so with groups it becomes ample. This, this problem, becomes amplified much more quickly with interpersonal relationships. I, you know, as I'm talking now, I'm thinking um, because and I love this kind of discussion which pushes my thinking as well but with inter, with people, you know I got I gotta believe it's going to come back to a kernel of wanting to make it, wanting to make things better.

Speaker 3: 42:22

Because I'm in the, you know, I'm an eternal optimist and, um, as a psychologist, I always believe that people can always change if they really want to change. It may be hard, I mean it's hard, it's hard and it's harder for certain things than others, but it starts with others, but it starts with wanting to change, it starts with wanting to improve something and I think if that really existed, that's the start. To then try to level the playing field for something If that doesn't exist, kind of nothing matters in my uninformed way of thinking about that in my uninformed way of thinking about that.

Speaker 2: 43:04

So could you do a research study on? I will tell you so. I recently started my PhD and now I am more aware of dissertations and research studies and how you have to get it really defined. So it won't take 18 years to do, but is it? What are you going to say?

Speaker 3: 43:20

16 years instead of 18.

Speaker 2: 43:23

Maybe, maybe, hopefully, but would there be a way, like even just thinking about the this group part of it, if that, if a group could overcome contempt, which would be really helpful in many areas of the world today, right, no-transcript? How would someone instigate that in order for huge things to change Like this, would that would cause revolutions, right, like just complete changes.

Speaker 3: 43:58

Yeah Well. So listen there, there have been many studies about the group, the group's side of that, whether they culture within contempt or not. There's many studies about that and it's tough. It's tough From what I know of that literature and I'm not the expert on that, but I know it pretty well, I, and it's tough. It's tough from what I know of that literature and I'm not the expert on that, but I know it pretty well. I think it's very tough.

Speaker 3: 44:16

I. I think that the, the lowest common denominator of anything that may be successful, starts with empathy. Empathy for the other, but being empathetic about people you're contemptuous about is a really tough thing, right. So then it becomes how to foster empathy, uh, facilitate contempt, maybe on an interpersonal level, between two people, that might be a little easier, even though it's still tough, right, but between groups it's extremely tough. I, I, so there have been studies on that, um, and they're, they're, they're, they're difficult, I, I, I don't know the degree to which that's been studied on the interpersonal level, however, and, um, again, I don't know if there were not that much, that much research on it. That might be an interesting thing to delve into, because you know, um, harmony across groups starts with harmony at home, right so.

Speaker 2: 45:13

I heard you on the speaking of psychology podcast and what first just fascinated me about all of this was the study that you did with the Olympics and the special Olympics. Can you speak about that?

Speaker 3: 45:28

Yeah, sure. So really briefly there there. Until that time there there were no studies in the in the literature that documented that facial expressions of emotion occurred spontaneously in real life situations in people around the world. Issue in July of 2004. And the next month, because I do judo, I was a member of the International Olympic International Judo Federation and I was going to Athens for the Athens Olympic Games. And when I got there I convinced a colleague of mine who's not a psychologist to do this study and he captured the images of the athletes at the Olympic Games. And he captured the images of the athletes at the Olympic Games right at the precise moment where they won and lost the medal. So you can imagine that's real life. It's highly emotional People all around the world, and we then measured what they did in their faces and we documented that the facial expressions of emotion that we've all thought were universal occurred in everybody, regardless of what culture they were from, in a spontaneous, real-life situation. And you know it's different. I mean winners showed smiles and the losers of those matches showed all other kinds of things. And there's other findings because we also captured their images on the podium.

Speaker 3: 46:50

Two weeks later, we also continued that study where, in the Paralympic Games, in the Paralympic Games, for every sport the disability is different. For judo it's blindness. So I asked my friend, hey, bob, bob Willingham, because he was staying for the Paralympics in judo and I was leaving Athens, would you like to continue the study? He said sure, and I said, hey, just take the same things with those blind athletes. So then he did, and we got those images and we did the same thing and we compared, when you so, and the blind athletes, all from different, 23, 24 different countries of the world, all did the same things as the sighted athletes. In fact, the correlation between the facial behavior of the blind and the sighted athletes was above 0.9. And so this was one. There's been other studies as well, but this was the most comprehensive study of the expressions of blind individuals in a real life situation that were spontaneous and um, there's.

Speaker 3: 47:57

So the important that is that although facial expressions of emotion may be universal, you know, there we do some things that are universal, that can be learned by culture, constant learning. But blind individuals and half of the sample that we had were congenitally blind. They're blind from birth. So when you have blind individuals doing the same thing as sighted individuals in a very complex way, in your face, all around the world in the same situations, there's no way they can learn that it it's got to be. That's one of the prime reasons why I believe that facial expressions of emotion.

Speaker 3: 48:35

We are born with the capability of producing these facial expressions of emotion. It's an innate capability of ours and that's why they're universal to all humans. That's why when you got your kids from India and they're disgusted about the vegetables you're making them eat, they're going to show that disgust, just as they'll show sadness, the same way you and I, when they lose something that's important to them. I mean, facial expressions of emotion are the closest thing that we have to a universal, common language across all humans, and that provides us a great platform to build that empathy that we talked about earlier. It does, it builds that empathy, that platform to understand people on that important emotional level, which is part of the physical, intellectual, emotional, spiritual. Yeah, I mean it's incredibly important, and so that's the study anyway.

Speaker 2: 49:29

Oh, that's so cool. I love that. What has been? This is my last question. What has been your favorite thing that you have studied or learned?

Speaker 3: 49:39

Well, okay, so I've been thinking about this as well. Um, probably not in the way you, you, you intend, but I don't know what's in your head, so I'll just say what's in my head. Um, perfect, you know, science is a big topic in the media today. The scientists listen to the scientists.

Speaker 3: 49:59

So, I'm a scientist, right, and in my area of expertise, like in many areas of expertise, like in the ones we talk about in the world today, there are disagreements across studies and scientists. And so then it makes me think what about science? As a scientist, I've been thinking about science, and you know, science is essentially a method for knowledge creation. Right, it's a method for, not for creating knowledge, and it's a great. It's a great method. Love it. I've spent my career doing it, I'll continue doing it. But when I think about it like that, I think that science is only one method of knowledge creation. It's one of many, and so it's a great method. Now, but it's only one. And there's so much other places where we can get knowledge and, more importantly, wisdom, because science is knowledge, but wisdom comes from people thinking about knowledge, and so then I think about where. So what we really want in society and for myself anyway, I'm talking about myself is knowledge and wisdom. So then I think we're like, in relation to your question, where's the wisdom? That that that I've, that has inspired me, right, and I got to tell you one, one aspect of wisdom that that I think our society doesn't place as much emphasis in, which I do think is unfortunate is the wisdom and knowledge of our elders, which, which I mean, I was very touched reading your, your, your parents and seeing that picture. I think it's you and your dad, things like that. Over my lifetime, I know a lot of scientists. I know a lot of them. If I ever had to choose three people who I would go for advice none of them have a PhD. One of them would be my father if he was still alive. He died, you know, many years ago, but this guy was a fountain of wisdom. He never get past elementary school. And again, science is great, but I think what we look for is knowledge and wisdom, and so I like thinking like this for myself. It may not be a prescription for everybody, but it grounds me. It grounds me in what I'm doing in my life.

Speaker 3: 52:19

I don't think that every finding I generate should be applied to you, kimberly Holmes. You got to do this because I found this. I don't believe that. I believe that my studies provide knowledge. The knowledge, the cumulative knowledge that's in a literature can be interpreted by somebody who can hopefully generate some wisdom from it and put that together with wisdom from other sources, like elders and cultural history, many other aspects, spiritual aspects of our life. I think there's a great source of wisdom. So I'm sorry to have that kind of complex answer to your question, but I I actually think about that a lot. And every study, going back concretely, if I think about studies, every study is, is, is is important to me, every publication was important to me, um, but I I don't want to demean them and I don't want to demean anybody else's science, but they're just studies, they're just knowledge. The important part about things in our life is about wisdom, and there are many sources of wisdom.

Speaker 2: 53:25

And the relationships that give us that wisdom right. So even just hearing you say that it helps to reprioritize some things of a lot like yes, you know, I have to read hundreds of research studies for my PhD right now, and some days I'm like what in the world did I sign up for? But at the end of the day, like, is the priority going to be for me to read one more study or to go and call my mom?

Speaker 3: 53:54

Oh, there you go. I mean, that's a great example, right? Because, as I you know. So back to the beginning, part of this, this interview.

Speaker 3: 54:03

Yeah, I keep my nose to the grindstone and I'm really good at it. I can be at the grindstone for hours at a time and then you forget about those important people around you. And one of the wisdom I have now in my 60s 61, is those relationships are really important and it takes work, it takes conscious work, and here I am telling you this, right, but yeah, so I do, and I do take that time to call my friend over there and call you know, spend some time here. And I do feel a little guilty. I could do that other thing, I could do that another analysis. But yeah, you come down to that point, right, I'm not listen.

Speaker 3: 54:49

Someday I'm not going to be around here, I'm not taking my money with me and I'm not taking my publication list. And, by the way, here's another thing I learned early along. I mean, I haven't. I'm very I'm sorry to take your time, but I'm very lucky to have a great CV. I have a great CV. I have a great publication list. Yeah, my kids don't give a shit. I'm sorry, my kids don't care. Nobody else cares. I hope you're going to edit that out, but I love it.

Speaker 3: 55:20

They shouldn't care. They shouldn't care. They shouldn't care about the fact that I know this, that and the other thing. They just care that I'm dead, and I think that's really cool, I think's really good. So when I when I think about that, I think about all the great scholars that I've met over my life. 20 years, 10 years after they retire, they're not talked about. So I've been watching this over my, my academic career. It made me think what's really important, you know it's is it really important to get that next publication or to do that? I mean it is, but but is it more important than maybe I should spend some time doing this other thing? Maybe I should call my friend Bob or go to Sacramento and see my other friend over there, or get on the phone and talk to this person.

Speaker 2: 56:08

That is good. That was a really good answer. Where can our audience find you? Find more of what you do follow you, tell us more I appreciate.

Speaker 3: 56:21

Yeah, thank you for that. Um, I will answer that question in a second, but I do want to go back to your, your, your. You know, I was taken aback by your praise and I was thinking about that after you said that, because I have conversations with people that are duds, quite frankly, and I think a lot of it has to do with my, my. What I said earlier is I was inspired by your, your, your, your mission and your goal and that, so that motivates me more. And then you ask great questions and you're a nice person and I think those, those go a long way, you know. So I'm trying to frame that anyway.

Speaker 3: 56:59

Um, listen, um, yeah, if you want to learn more about body language and stuff, you can visit my company. That's wwwhumantel, that's h-u-m-i-n-t-e-l-lcom, and there you can find cutting edge online training and all other kinds of stuff to help people understand body language better. You can sign up for courses, online courses to improve one's skills to become a body language expert. You can also find us and follow us on Twitter, facebook, youtube, linkedin, all the usual stuff. Our office posts new content almost every day, and so, and there's our contact information. I love to hear from you and your audience. You are a gracious host and, again, I just love that mission and I love that story of you and your parents.

Speaker 2: 57:52

Well, I appreciate that so much, but I appreciate your time and I know you are busy doing many things adding knowledge for us to use to the world, but really I mean I am honest when I say this is one of the favorite conversations that I've had, if not the most, because number one it was. We talked about so many unexpected things and that was amazing. But number two, just your genuineness and you talked about that even earlier and, knowing that you are a highly published scholar, I mean all of these things you've done so much but you're still thinking about questions and wrestling with answers and being genuine in your response and how it relates to real life, and it's just been very refreshing for me. So thank you for your time and everything that you have done. Um, if there's ever anything I can do or whatever I would, I would love to be honored to do whatever I can for you or your or anyone that you know well, thank you so much.

Speaker 3: 59:07

It's been. It's been a pleasure.

Speaker 2: 59:09

Here are my three key pies takeaways from today's episode with Dr David Matsumoto. Number one there are seven universal emotions Y'all. I was overwhelmed and overtaken when we talked about that in today's episode because, while I knew that earlier in my life, it's something that I had forgotten and as I have learned more about relationships, about connecting with other people, especially cross-culturally, or even just cross in your home-ly, it is something that still applies. There are seven things that we can boil back down to to really help us understand what another person might be thinking or feeling in any given moment. And what I loved even more was how he also explained what the driver for those emotions was, when he talked about how anger the driving force underneath that is goal obstruction. It set off so many light bulbs in my mind of when I deal with anger, how my husband has dealt with anger in the past, and realizing that if I am obstructing my husband as an example in something that he's wanting to do, then it's more likely he's going to get angry at me. So how, instead of being an obstacle to him, can I be a support to him? How can I, in my mind, put myself beside him as someone running with him, carrying the baton right next to him, and how can I help him reach his goals, as opposed to being an obstacle for his goals? And also, as we learned, one of the other emotions, happiness, is goal attainment. So if I can help my husband, my child, my best friend, my employee, my boss, if I can help those people reach their goals, how much happier is our relationship going to be, which, I would venture to say, although I have not done a research study on it, would lead to a more satisfying relationship as well.

Speaker 2: 1:01:16

The second key pies takeaway that I have for today is that one of those universal emotions we talked about is contempt, and it is the most destructive of the seven. We talked in depth about how that could be and why that could be, but did you catch what Dr Matsumoto said, that the best way that you can fight and combat a contemptuous spirit is starting within your home, the way that you interact with the people in your house, what you teach your children and friends? In today's world, it is more important than ever that we are teaching our children, we are acting in our marriage in a way that is showing love and kindness and respect and acceptance to all of the people around us. Now that doesn't mean we have to agree with everything that they do, but we can respect them and treat them like a human being who has dignity and worth, regardless of whether or not we agree. I know it's hard to do, but I believe that you are strong and that all of us focusing on this and realizing it's something we really need to move towards in our homes and in our world, we can begin to make a difference.

Speaker 2: 1:02:33

And the third key pies takeaway I had from today's episode is this the last question that I asked Dr Matsumoto of what his favorite research study, the best thing he's learned over decades of intense and hard research, and his answer really shook me to my core when he said there's a lot of science and knowledge out there, but what really matters is wisdom. When he spoke about how one of the first people he would call for advice in his life is not another psychologist or scientist, but it would be his father, I stopped in my tracks and thought it's so true. My dad, my mom, my mom, who only has her associate's degree, never went past two years of college. She's the person that I would go to before anything, and my dad as well. They are people in my life.

Speaker 2: 1:03:30

Now my dad is a bit of an outcast or an outlier. He does have his PhD, but even before he had his PhD, because of who he is and how wise he is, I went to him and put his opinion and guidance above that of so many others that I might've learned about in school or in college. I valued that and I valued their wisdom and still value their wisdom because of the relationship that I have with them in my life. I've watched them walk the walk and they are the kind of people who actually live the way that they talk about living. I trust them. I've seen them do amazing things for other people, love others, respect others, and that is wisdom that is more pure and more needed in our lives than all of the research and science combined.

Speaker 1: 1:04:32

Thanks so much for watching today's episode. If you enjoyed, send it to a family member than all of the research and science combined.