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The Monthly.com , Australia, has reported on the Mind and it’s Potential Conference that took place December 2009 in Sydney, Australia.

The video below of Dr. Daniel Siegel MD, a psychiatrist, is about Interpersonal Neurobiology, “We feel; therefore we learn the neuroscience of social emotion.”

The video explores the mind, the brain and relationships and how they work together and influence the way we learn and live.

  “Just imaging doing something (mental activity) can in fact change the physical structure of the brain.  Also, the focus of attention can alter connections in the brain and also change the physical structure.“

Dr. Siegel is also the executive director of the Mindsight Institute whose mission is to link science with practical applications to cultivate mindsight skills and well-being.

Click here to view the embedded video.

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 Is the attractiveness of a person’s face impacted by the facial expression they make ?

Most people think that smiling makes a person look more attractive.  Is this really true?

Researchers at the University of Portsmouth in the UK decided to test the theory and find out not only if attractive people are more attractive when they smile but if attractive people look less attractive if they show anger or displeasure.

They also tested  the theory on unattractive people to see if it goes both ways.  They studied whether unattractive people would be considered more attractive if they smiled.

Medical Xpress outlined the results of this research, which is published in the Journal of Nonverbal Behavior.

Participants viewed photographs of various individuals making one of the seven universal facial expressions of emotion (anger, sadness, happiness, fear, disgust leaving out contempt).

Most of the participants rated people as attractive regardless of the facial expression they were making.  Interestingly, this worked for the unattractive people as well. They did not do better when smiling leading to the conclusion of the study;  the facial expression a person makes does not affect how attractive they are perceived to be by others.

The researchers were eager to point out that facial expressions are more likely than not to still play a role in helping people decide whether someone is approachable.

 Do YOU change your notion of attractiveness when you see someone with an angry expression   OR
Does the study’s results make perfect sense ?