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Annotated Bibliography

Micro Expressions

Austin Forst
Professor Malcolm Campbell

UWRT 1103

February 29, 2016

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Annotated Bibliography

Hurley, Carolyn M. "Do You See What I See? Learning to Detect Micro Expressions of
Emotion." 36.3 (2011): 371-81. Web. 14 Mar. 2016. <http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/
s11031-011-9257-2/fulltext.html>.
This source is an academic journal that is written by Carolyn Hurley who conducted an
experiment to show how different factors affect the results of detecting hidden facial expressions
and emotions. Not only does this article help explain what micro expressions are but it shows a
complete application of how they are, or can be, detected. The author starts out by giving a full
explanation of micro expressions and what its like to be able to spot them. The ability to detect
micro expressions is an important skill for understanding a persons true emotional state,
however, these quick expressions are often difficult to detect. Detecting micro expressions is
something anybody can do, but one truly needs to be trained in order to spot them accurately.
This journal as well as the experiment has been completed by a Doctor of Philosophy degree at
the University of Buffalo. The credentials of the authors are completely objective because of the
intensive experiment the author did herself. Considering this is an academic source and has
research done with an analysis of the information at the end, I would consider this source to be
very reliable. I can see the entire process of what is being studied and why, how it was measured,
and the results at the end of it all. Overall I believe this source was useful for the introduction
and background information about Micro expressions, however, I do not think I will use this as
source in my project. This source did not provide enough facts on what I am specifically looking
for which is what are Micro Expressions, why are they useful and wether they should be used to
convict someone of a crime or not.

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Ekman, Paul. "Facial Expressions Archives - Paul Ekman Group, LLC." Paul Ekman Group
LLC. Web. 15 Mar. 2016. <http://www.paulekman.com/category/facial-expressions/>.
This source is a reliable website written by Micro Expression specialist, Paul Ekman.
This website gives a complete overview of how Ekman goes about detecting lies and different
micro expressions in a lot of crime situations and court cases. Ekman states My job is to try to
help the police make more accurate judgments. Most importantly, not to mistakenly judge
innocent people as guilty of a crime. Some of his biggest advice throughout this website is to try
and never misjudge a truthful person. He claims in the long run it will do someone good to keep
those relationships with people one may or may not have been questioning. Ekmans second big
piece of advice is to try to not put people in a position where they will be tempted to lie. Its best
to form questions in a way that makes the potential liar feel like they dont need to lie. In his
research he narrows it down to 5 signs of detecting liars which are: fidgeting, blinking, dilated
pupils, eye contact, and differences in the way a person acts. He personally uses all of this
information to try and analyze when someone is lying wether it be someone random talking to
him on the street or when he is trying to convict someone of a crime. Paul Ekman is one of the
most efficient and well known psychologists when it comes to micro expressions. For decades,
he has conducted his own experiments and came up with his own scientific evidence. This
reliable website is one I will be using in my project because it has so much information that was
researched by Paul Ekman himself that gives a very clear understanding of what micro
expressions are and how detecting them can convict criminals of being guilty. This source has
also helped shaped my understanding of my topic more in a way that makes me realize these

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hidden facial expressions that have yet to be as intensely researched as other psychological topics
do play an incredibly important role in the court world and they can truly show wether someone
is telling a lie or not.
NPR. Microexpressions: More Than Meets The Eye. Web. 15 Mar. 2016. <http://www.npr.org/
2013/05/10/182861380/microexpressions-more-than-meets-the-eye>.
This is a transcript of an interview which aired on NPR. Ira Flatow is the well
known talk host for NPR and for this specific interview he travels to Stanford University to
speak with respected psychology professor David Matsumoto about his job training national
security to recognize micro expressions. Matsumoto says those subtle cues may reveal how an
interview subject is feeling, helping officials to hone their line of questioning. As the interview
continues Flatow asks significant questions such as Are micro expressions significant in law
enforcement interrogations?. Which brings me to one of my biggest points in my project.
Reading these hidden emotions is indeed accurate enough to tell if someone is trying to hide
something or did something wrong. Matsumoto goes on to explain the difference between macro
expressions and micro expressions and their applications in society. He gives a whole overview
on how macro expressions are cross cultural and humanity wouldnt be able to function properly
without being able to read these macro expressions, however, society has made it just fine
without always noticing these micro expressions. Technically in this article what the professor
says could be his own opinion, but overall the raw facts are there. All the research points mostly
in the same direction when saying although we may not need micro expressions in order to
function, we are able to detect suspicious behavior when they are able to be read. This is a

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interview on a radio, but this source is reliable because the information is being recorded straight
from a psychology professor. I plan on using this source in my project because Matsumoto gave
some significant information about micro expressions and more that could be useful in my
argument and explanation of expressions.
Yan, Wen-Jing, Qi Wu, Jing Liang, Yu-Hsin Chen, and Xiaolan Fu. "How Fast Are the Leaked
Facial Expressions: The Duration of Micro-Expr." Essions. 16 July 2013. Web. 15 Mar. 2016.
This source is a scholarly journal written by a number of scholarly researchers. Similar to one of
my sources above, this journal is also the result of an experiment done by the authors themselves
to determine the duration of a micro expression. At first the journal begins with a basic overview
of what a micro expression is and how they are applied to society. Then the actual experiment is
explained in the introduction. For this experiment, participants were each instructed to watch a
different video and rate the emotional intensity of the video. As the participants are watching
these videos, the scientists can measure the actual duration of emotion the person is feeling even
if they rate it as more or less intense than what shows on the scans. These feelings may even
subconscious and they dont realize how much these videos are actually affecting their emotions.
In this specific experiment the information is strictly objective due to the intensive experiment
and research that was put into this analytical information. I do believe this scholarly journal was
reliable, however the information I may take out of this research will be slim due to the fact that I
am not focusing on the duration of micro expressions in particular. That being said, I can still
take the research that shows the little time it actually takes for someone to naturally hide an
emotion and what that means for the experts trying to detect the raw feelings. Even though this is

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not exactly what I was looking for in a source, I still think it is very useful to put a different
insight in my paper and can help make an interesting point when giving a detailed overview of
micro expressions in general.