Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
  1. Home
  2. Search

Refine search

Refine search

Access:
Content type:
Publication date:
Apply   From and To filters
Subject: Show more
Journals Show more
Publishers: Show more
Societies Show more
Series: Show more
Collections: Show more

Actions for selected content:

Select all | Deselect all
  • View selected items
  • Export citations
  • Download PDF (zip)
  • Save to Kindle
  • Save to Dropbox
  • Save to Google Drive

Save Search

You can save your searches here and later view and run them again in "My saved searches".

Please provide a title, maximum of 40 characters.
Cancel
×

33 results

Page 1 of 2

The Mechanism of Human Facial Expression
  • G. -B. Duchenne de Boulogne
  • Edited and translated by R. Andrew Cuthbertson
  • Published online:
    10 November 2010
    Print publication:
    27 July 1990
  • In Mécanisme de la physionomie humaine, the great nineteenth-century French neurologist Duchenne de Boulogne combined his intimate knowledge of facial anatomy with his skill in photography and expertise in using electricity to stimulate individual facial muscles to produce a fascinating interpretation of the ways in which the human face portrays emotions. This book was pivotal in the development of psychology and physiology as it marked the first time that photography had been used to illustrate, and therefore 'prove', a series of experiments. In this volume, Andrew Cuthbertson has provided an English translation of Duchenne, complete with a reproduction of the marvellous Album of photographs. The four commentary chapters by modern experts describe the relevance of Duchenne's findings to the fields of experimental psychology, plastic surgery, neurology and physiology. This book will therefore be valued by all those who deal with facial expression, including psychologists, physicians and those involved in the fine arts and photography.

  • Chapter 10 - The muscles of joy and benevolence (m. zygomaticus major and the inferior part of m. orbicularis oculi)

  • G. -B. Duchenne de Boulogne
  • Edited and translated by R. Andrew Cuthbertson
  • Book:
    The Mechanism of Human Facial Expression
    Published online:
    10 November 2010
    Print publication:
    27 July 1990, pp 69-73

  • Summary

    Plates 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36

    (Compare alternately the two sides of Plates 30, 35 and 36, by masking the opposite side.)

    Plate 30: To study the fundamental and secondary expressive lines produced by the contraction of m. zygomaticus major in an old man (shown also in Plates 3, 6, 7, 8, 9, 12, 13, 14, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, and 22). On the right, electrical excitation, which is strong but quite limited to m. zygomaticus major, showing development of the fundamental and secondary lines of this muscle: false joy or laughter. On the left, a relaxed face.

    Plate 31: Slightly stronger electrical excitation of both mm. zygomaticus major: development of the same fundamental and secondary expressive lines of joy, with mild contraction of some fibers of the muscle called the sphincter of the eyelids: false laughter.

    Plate 32: The same subject as in Plates 30 and 31, showing that natural laughter really is constituted by the association of m. zygomaticus major and the inferior part of m. orbicularis oculi. Natural laughter, by the voluntary contraction of the two mm. zygomaticus major and of the inferior part of mm. orbicularis oculi.

    Plate 33: The same subject, showing that the wrinkles radiating from the lateral canthus of the eyelids, due to the action of mm. zygomaticus major, disappear when mm. frontalis is stimulated at the same time. Maximal stimulation of mm. zygomaticus major and of mm. frontalis: a false incomplete expression of agreeable surprise, or admiration. […]

  • Foreword

  • G. -B. Duchenne de Boulogne
  • Edited and translated by R. Andrew Cuthbertson
  • Book:
    The Mechanism of Human Facial Expression
    Published online:
    10 November 2010
    Print publication:
    27 July 1990, pp 39-41

  • Summary

    The facts brought to light by my electrophysiological research on the mechanism of human facial expression are of considerable importance; they are, in general, so unexpected or in opposition to certain prejudices and to general opinion that experimental demonstration is the only way to make them acceptable to science.

    Photography, as true as a mirror, can illustrate my electrophysiological experiments and help to judge the value of the deductions that I have made from them.

    From 1852, convinced of the impossibility of popularizing or even of publishing this research without the aid of photography, I approached some talented and artistic photographers. These first trials were not, and could not be, successful. In photography, as in painting or sculpture, you can only transmit well what you perceive well. Art does not rely only on technical skills. For my research, it was necessary to know how to put each expressive line into relief by a skillful play of light. This skill was beyond the most dextrous artist; he did not understand the physiological facts I was trying to demonstrate.

    Thus I needed to initiate myself into the art of photography.

    I photographed most of the 73 plates that make up the Scientific Section of this Album myself, or presided over their execution, and so that none shall doubt the facts presented here, I have made sure that not one of the photographs has been retouched.

  • Foreword

  • G. -B. Duchenne de Boulogne
  • Edited and translated by R. Andrew Cuthbertson
  • Book:
    The Mechanism of Human Facial Expression
    Published online:
    10 November 2010
    Print publication:
    27 July 1990, pp 101-103

  • Summary

    My Scientific Section could be considered to have completed my appointed task. The faces in that section demonstrate the principal facts of the grammar and orthography of human facial expression with the most complete empiricism. The six subjects were of differing ages, both male and female. Some of them had an attractive facial expression. However, some readers must have disapproved of the unpleasantness of some of the faces.

    The old man photographed in most of my electrophysiological experiments did have common, ugly features. To a sophisticated man such a choice may seem strange. Some artists and eminent amateurs, believing that this part of my album had been assembled from an aesthetic point of view, asked me: Why use such an ugly face for an artistic subject? I would certainly like to present only young and beautiful faces but, above all, I had scientifically to demonstrate the workings of the lines of the face; for this, an electrophysiological study of Adonis would have been much less fitting than my old and ugly subject.

    I would remind the reader of the motives governing my choice of subjects – “I have preferred this coarse face to one of noble, beautiful features, not because in order to be true to nature one must show her imperfections; I simply wanted to prove that, despite defects of shape and lack of plastic beauty, every human face can become spiritually beautiful through the accurate rendering of his or her emotions.”

  • Chapter 7 - The muscle of reflection (superior part of m. orbicularis oculi, that part of the muscle called the sphincter of the eyelids)

  • G. -B. Duchenne de Boulogne
  • Edited and translated by R. Andrew Cuthbertson
  • Book:
    The Mechanism of Human Facial Expression
    Published online:
    10 November 2010
    Print publication:
    27 July 1990, pp 52-55

  • Summary

    Plates 12, 13, 14, 15

    (Alternate and compare the two sides of Plates 12 and 14 by masking the opposite side.)

    Plate 12: Showing, as does Plate 13, a study of the contraction of and the expression produced by the superior part of m. orbicularis oculi (B, Figure 1), in an old man (also shown in Plates 3, 7, 8, 9).

    On the right, moderate electrization of the superior part of m. orbicularis oculi: reflection.

    On the left: attention.

    Plate 13: Stronger electrization of the superior part of m. orbicularis oculi, with slight lowering of the labial commissures: meditation, mental concentration.

    Plate 14: Designed to show a comparison between the maximal contraction of the superior part of m. orbicularis oculi and m. corrugator supercilii, in the same individual.

    On the left, very strong electrization of the superior part of m. orbicularis oculi: dissatisfaction, somber thoughts.

    On the right, electrization of m. corrugator supercilii.

    Plate 15: To demonstrate that the mechanism of voluntary contraction of the superior part of m. orbicularis oculi is exactly the same as when it occurs under the influence of the electric current.

    A strong voluntary contraction of the superior part of m. orbicularis oculi in a young subject (see his photographic portrait, Plate 4): meditation, mental concentration.

    Further notes on these plates

    Technical details

    At the moment the photograph in Plate 12 was taken, my subject was looking opposite him, at an object on which I had strongly secured his attention; his left eyebrow was raised; his forehead was transversely creased across its whole breadth; his mm. frontalis were lightly acting and expressed the state of his spirit: attention.

  • Chapter 16 - A critical study of several antiquities from the point of view of m. corrugator supercilii and m. frontalis

  • G. -B. Duchenne de Boulogne
  • Edited and translated by R. Andrew Cuthbertson
  • Book:
    The Mechanism of Human Facial Expression
    Published online:
    10 November 2010
    Print publication:
    27 July 1990, pp 93-100

  • Summary

    Plates 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73

    Plates 66 & 67: Head of Arrotino (the spy, the knife grinder, and so on), frontal view and profile. The transverse forehead lines, extending across the whole breadth of the brow, are not compatible with either the obliqueness or the curvature of the eyebrows due to the antagonism between m. frontalis and m. corrugator supercilii. The former muscle produces these transverse lines on the forehead and the latter this oblique and curved pattern of the eyebrow.

    Plate 68: The same head as Plate 67 on which the curvature of the eyebrows has been adapted to the forehead lines, true to the action of m. frontalis (see Plates 7 and 8).

    Plate 69: The same head as Plate 67 on which the forehead lines and the sculpting of the lateral portions of the brow have been adapted to the obliqueness and curvature of the eyebrow, true to the action of m. corrugator supercilii (see Plates 19, 20, 24, and 25).

    Plate 70: Head of the Laocoön of Rome. The medial lines of the forehead are in perfect accord with the oblique and curved movements transmitted to the eyebrow by the contraction of m. corrugator supercilii, but the sculpting of the lateral portions of the forehead is impossible. […]

  • Chapter 5 - Anatomical preparations, and portraits of the subjects who underwent electrophysiological experiments

  • G. -B. Duchenne de Boulogne
  • Edited and translated by R. Andrew Cuthbertson
  • Book:
    The Mechanism of Human Facial Expression
    Published online:
    10 November 2010
    Print publication:
    27 July 1990, pp 42-48

  • Summary

    Plates 1, 2a, 2b, 3, 4, 5, 6

    Plate 3: The face of an old man who served in numerous electrophysiological experiments, photographed in repose.

    Plate 4: The face in repose of a young man who appears in later photographs showing facial expressions produces both naturally and electrophysiologically.

    Plate 5: Photograph of a young girl frowning, on whom several electrophysiological experiments were performed.

    Plate 6: To show that when an electrode is applied to a nerve trunk that supplies several muscles only a grimace is produced. In this electrization of the temporofacial trunk we see contraction of all the muscles supplied by it; the grimace produced is similar to a tic of the face.

    Further notes on these plates

    The individual I chose as my principal subject for the experiments shown in this album was an old toothless man, with a thin face, whose features, without being absolutely ugly, approached ordinary triviality and whose facial expression was in perfect agreement with his inoffensive character and his restricted intelligence.

    The reasons that determined my choice were:

    1. In the elderly, facial muscle contractions produce all the expressive lines of the face (both fundamental and secondary lines).

    2. The thinness of my subject favored the development of these expressive lines, and at the same time facilitated localized electrization of the muscles of his face.

    3. […]

  • Chapter 18 - Further aesthetic electrophysiological studies

  • G. -B. Duchenne de Boulogne
  • Edited and translated by R. Andrew Cuthbertson
  • Book:
    The Mechanism of Human Facial Expression
    Published online:
    10 November 2010
    Print publication:
    27 July 1990, pp 114-210

  • Summary

    Plates 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, and 84

    Plate 79: Maternal happiness mixed with pain, from a psychological and aesthetic study of the expression resulting from the conflict of joy and of crying.

    By covering the left eye, joy of a mother who sees her infant recovering from a serious illness; covering the right eye, the same maternal joy, united with pain produced by the death of another child. Electrical stimulation of m. corrugator supercilii, associated with the natural expression of joy.

    Plate 80: Compassionate smile of charity. Benevolent smile, in covering the right side of the face; smile of pity, in covering the left side of the face. Light electrical contraction of m. zygomaticus minor, associated with natural laughter.

    Plate 81: Lady Macbeth: Had he not resembled

    My father as he slept, I had done't.

    Moderate expression of cruelty. Feeble electrical contraction of m. procerus (P, Plate 1).

    Plate 82: Lady Macbeth: Come, you spirits

    That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,

    And fill me, from crown to the toe, top-full

    Of direst cruelty.

    Strong expression of cruelty. Electrical contraction of m. procerus.

    Plate 83: Lady Macbeth – about to assassinate King Duncan. Expression of ferocious cruelty. Maximal electrical contraction of m. procerus.

    Plate 84: Lady Macbeth – receiving King Duncan with a perfidious smile. […]

  • Chapter 14 - The muscles complementary to surprise (muscles that lower the mandible)

  • G. -B. Duchenne de Boulogne
  • Edited and translated by R. Andrew Cuthbertson
  • Book:
    The Mechanism of Human Facial Expression
    Published online:
    10 November 2010
    Print publication:
    27 July 1990, pp 87-88

  • Summary

    Plates 54, 55, 56, 57

    Plate 54: To study the lines, the skin folds, and other changes produced by the muscles that lower the mandible, in an old man (also shown in Plates 3, 7, 8, 9, 12, 13, 14, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 37, 38, 39, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 51, 52, 53).

    Voluntary lowering of the lower jaw with the skin of the lower part of the face; inexpressive movement.

    Plate 55: To show that it is not sufficient to open the mouth and elevate the eyebrows to portray astonishment. These movements may just produce a grimace, unless there is a perfect rapport between them.

    Maximal voluntary opening of the mouth, with voluntary, mild elevation of the eyebrows: astonishment badly rendered by the subject: a ridiculous and inane expression.

    Plate 56: To study combined moderate contractions of m. frontalis and of the muscles that lower the mandible. Voluntary, moderate opening of the mouth and proportional electrical stimulation of mm. frontalis: surprise.

    Plate 57: To study the combined maximal contraction of mm. frontalis and the muscles that lower the mandible. Voluntary maximal opening of the mouth and energetic electrical stimulation of mm. frontalis: astonishment, stupefaction, amazement.

    Further notes on these plates

    Technical details

    The muscles that lower the mandible and their motor nerves are covered by m. platysma and cannot be electrized without this latter muscle contracting at the same time; their independent excitation is only possible when m. platysma is atrophied or no longer excitable.

  • Chapter 6 - The muscle of attention (m. frontalis)

  • G. -B. Duchenne de Boulogne
  • Edited and translated by R. Andrew Cuthbertson
  • Book:
    The Mechanism of Human Facial Expression
    Published online:
    10 November 2010
    Print publication:
    27 July 1990, pp 49-51

  • Summary

    Plates 7, 8, 9, 10, 11

    (Alternate and compare the two sides of Plates 7, 9, 10, and 11 by masking the opposite side.)

    Plate 7: A study of the mechanism of action of m. frontalis in an old man (see his photographic portrait, Plate 3).

    On the right, a moderate degree of electrical excitation of m. frontalis; fundamental lines (elevation and curvature of the eyebrow) and secondary lines (frontal folds, rounded and concentric with the arch of the eyebrow): attention.

    On the left, a relaxed face.

    Plate 8: Showing how the secondary expressive lines of attention join and are continuous at the midline during contraction of the right m. frontalis.

    Plate 9: A study of m. frontalis in maximum contraction.

    On the right maximal excitation of m. frontalis: profound attention.

    On the left, a relaxed face.

    Plate 10: Showing the expressive lines of m. frontalis in a young girl (see her portrait, Plate 5).

    On the left, electrization of m. frontalis, with development of the fundamental line (elevation and curvature of the eyebrow, without frontal folds): attention.

    On the right, spontaneous lowering of the eyebrow, due to very bright light.

    Plate 11: Showing the secondary lines (frontal ridges, which are both irregular and numerous) produced by strong electrical excitation of m. frontalis, in a woman aged 41 years whose skin was tanned by the sun.

    On the right the electrization of m. frontalis; elevation and curvature of the eyebrow; frontal ridges are irregular and numerous: attention. On the left, a relaxed face.

  • Chapter 2 - Principal facts that emerge from my electrophysiological experiments

  • G. -B. Duchenne de Boulogne
  • Edited and translated by R. Andrew Cuthbertson
  • Book:
    The Mechanism of Human Facial Expression
    Published online:
    10 November 2010
    Print publication:
    27 July 1990, pp 12-19

  • Summary

    In order to know and judge the influence on expression of the facial muscles, I have produced contractions of the latter with electrical currents. I always started with the face in repose, when it showed internal calm; the gaze of my subject was initially fixed and directed forward.

    First I put each of the muscles into isolated contraction, on one side and then both sides of the face at the same time; then, progressing from the simple to the composite, I combined these isolated muscle contractions in all the variations possible, by making the different named muscles contract, two by two and three by three.

    I will describe concisely, in the following paragraphs, the principal facts that have come to light by these isolated contractions and by the combined contractions of the muscles of the face.

    Isolated contractions of the muscles of the face

    The experimental study of isolated contractions of the muscles of the face shows that they are either completely expressive, incompletely expressive, expressive in a complementary way, or inexpressive.

    Isolated contractions that are completely expressive

    There are muscles that produce an expression of their own by their isolated action.

    At first glance this assertion appears paradoxical. Although a small number of muscles have been accorded a special influence on facial expression, one would at the same time imagine that all expression depends on the harmonious working and synergy of at least several other muscles.

  • Preface

  • G. -B. Duchenne de Boulogne
  • Edited and translated by R. Andrew Cuthbertson
  • Book:
    The Mechanism of Human Facial Expression
    Published online:
    10 November 2010
    Print publication:
    27 July 1990, pp 1-2

  • Summary

    “When the spirit is roused, the human face becomes a living picture where the emotions are registered with much delicacy and energy, where each movement of the spirit is expressed by a feature, each action by a characteristic, the swift, sharp impression of which anticipates the will and discloses our most secret feelings.”

    [Buffon, Histoire de l'homme]

    The spirit is thus the source of expression. It activates the muscles that portray our emotions on the face with characteristic patterns. Consequently the laws that govern the expressions of the human face can be discovered by studying muscle action.

    I sought the solution to this problem for many years. Using electrical currents, I have made the facial muscles contract to speak the language of the emotions and the sentiments. “Experimentation,” said Bacon, “is a type of question applied to nature in order to make it speak.” This careful study of isolated muscle action showed me the reason behind the lines, wrinkles, and folds of the moving face. These lines and folds are precise signs, which in their various combinations result in facial expression. Thus by proceeding from the expressive muscle to the spirit that set it in action, I have been able to study and discover the mechanism and laws of human facial expression.

Page 1 of 2