Table Of ContentT H E F A C I A L
D I S P L A Y S O F
L E A D E R S
C A R L S E N I O R
EDITED BY
The Facial Displays of Leaders
Carl Senior
Editor
The Facial Displays
of Leaders
Editor
Carl Senior
Aston University
Birmingham, UK
The University of Gibraltar
Europa Point, Gibraltar
ISBN 978-3-319-94534-7 ISBN 978-3-319-94535-4 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-94535-4
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Dedicated to
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Contents
1 The Facial Displays of Leadership: A Systematic Review of
the Literature 1
Carl Senior
2 Formidability and Alliance Politics in Humans and
Nonhuman Species 27
Christopher D. Watkins
3 Facing Your Competition: Findings from the 2016
Presidential Election 51
Patrick A. Stewart, Elena Svetieva, Austin Eubanks, and
Jason M. Miller
4 In/Appropriate Aggression in Presidential Debate: How
Trump’s Nonverbal Displays Intensified Verbal Norm
Violations in 2016 73
Erik P. Bucy and Zijian Harrison Gong
vii
viii Contents
5 The Evolutionary Psychology of Leadership Trait
Perception 97
Kristen Knowles
6 Facial Displays of Dominance in Non- human Primates 123
Rachel M. Petersen, Constance Dubuc, and James P. Higham
7 About Face! Facial Status Cues and Perceptions of
Charismatic Leadership 145
Caroline F. Keating
Index 171
Notes on Contributors
Erik P. Bucy is the Marshall and Sharleen Formby Regents Professor of Strategic
Communication in the College of Media and Communication at Texas Tech
University. He is the author of the book Image Bite Politics: News and the Visual
Framing of Elections (with Maria Elizabeth Grabe, Oxford, 2009) and editor of
the Sourcebook for Political Communication Research: Methods, Measures, and
Analytical Techniques (with R. Lance Holbert, Routledge, 2013). His research
interests include visual and nonverbal analysis of political news, normative theo-
ries of media and democracy, and public opinion about the press. Bucy is the
past editor of Politics and the Life Sciences, an interdisciplinary journal published
by Cambridge University Press.
Constance Dubuc has conducted research at Université de Montréal, the
German Primate Center, the Max-Planck Institute for Evolutionary
Anthropology, New York University, and the University of Cambridge. She is
interested in the evolution of reproductive strategies with a focus on sexual sig-
nalling, variance in male reproductive success, and male-female relationships.
Austin Eubanks is a Social Psychology PhD student at the University of
Arkansas under the mentorship of Scott Eidelman. Broadly, his research inter-
ests are primarily in political psychology, but more specifically he is interested in
Construal Level Theory (i.e., psychological distance) and political/social values
systems. Austin is most interested in refining the methodology used to study
social psychology and is an advocate of open/transparent science that follows
high-quality research practices.
ix
x Notes on Contributors
Zijian Harrison Gong is an assistant professor in the Department of Advertising
at Texas Tech University. His research focuses on motivated processing of media
to understand how message execution elements such as design and layout impact
selective attention, recall, and attitude formation, and how source and message
factors impact the persuasiveness of media content. Practically, his research find-
ings offer tangible insights that help media practitioners enhance the persuasive-
ness of their messages. His research papers have been published in a range of
leading journals in media and communication, including Communication
Monographs, Media Psychology, and the Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic
Media.
James P. Higham is Associate Professor of Anthropology at New York
University. He has worked on species-specific and comparative studies of species
in several anthropoid genera, and has guest-edited several special issues on topics
of sexual selection and communication, including on field endocrinology
(Hormones and Behavior, with Jim Roney), multimodal communication
(Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, with Eileen Hebets), primate signals
(American Journal of Primatology, with Stuart Semple), and primate coloration
(International Journal of Primatology).
Caroline F. Keating is Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Colgate
University in Hamilton, New York, USA. She is a Syracuse University
PhD. Keating studies how nonverbal cues relate to social dominance, leadership,
and charisma. With collaborators, she showed that humans convey dominance
through facial status gestures akin to those of other primates; that dominant
children and adults are especially good deceivers; and that persuasive performers
often begin by kidding themselves. Keating also studies the charismatic pro-
cesses groups use to inspire devotion. She teaches seminars in leadership and
social bonds from evolutionary, developmental, and cross-cultural perspectives.
Kristen Knowles is Lecturer of Psychology in the Division of Psychology and
Sociology at Queen Margaret University. Her research focuses on the applica-
tion of an evolutionary framework to political psychology. Kristen’s recent work
examines the effects of individual differences on voting decisions and leadership
preferences, using faces and voices as experimental stimuli. Kristen is a member
of QMU’s Centre for Applied Social Sciences (CASS) and the International
Society for Political Psychology (ISPP).
Jason M. Miller is a graduate student in the Social Psychology program at the
University of Kansas, Lawrence. His research focuses primarily on political psy-
Notes on Contributo rs xi
chology, and the uses of ideology and belief to justify prejudice. He also does
research on how important political events shift the social acceptability of differ-
ent prejudices.
Rachel M. Petersen is a PhD candidate in Biological Anthropology at
New York University. Her master’s thesis studied how social integration in rhe-
sus macaques effects health through the immune and endocrine system. Her
dissertation research will focus on mechanisms of female mate choice, specifi-
cally mate choice that occurs within the female reproductive tract after mating,
in order to better understand reproductive strategies in male and female
primates.
Carl Senior studies non-verbal behaviour which includes the way the face is
perceived and has examined the skills, traits, and motives associated with quali-
ties such as social dominance, power, and leadership. He is also interested in
learning more about the mechanisms of social behaviour in naturalistic settings.
He was elected a fellow of the British Psychological Society in 2015 and is also
a visiting professor to the University of Gibraltar.
Patrick A. Stewart is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University
of Arkansas, Fayetteville. He has published over 50 journal articles and chapters,
as well as four books, including Debatable Humor: Laughing Matters on the 2008
Presidential Primary Campaign (2012). His work on the nonverbal behaviour of
politicians and their audiences has been published in The New York Times and
The Washington Post and reported on in a broad range of popular press outlets.
He is a certified Facial Action Coding System (FACS) coder whose research
concentrates on the emotional response of followers to leaders.
Elena Svetieva is Assistant Professor in Leadership Communication at the
Department of Communication, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs.
Prior to joining the department, Elena was a postdoctoral research fellow at the
Center for Creative Leadership, the number one leadership development pro-
vider and think-t hank in North America. Her research focuses on emotion com-
munication and nonverbal behaviour in effective leadership, including person
perception, feedback, and emotion regulation between leaders and followers.
She studies these processes using interdisciplinary methods, with a strong focus
on physiological and behavioural measures such as the Facial Action Coding
System (FACS).
Christopher D. Watkins is Senior Lecturer in Psychology at Abertay University
in Scotland. His main research interest is dominance, rivalry, competition, and
