People often rely on facial expressions to understand emotions, both in everyday interactions and in research settings. Psychological studies commonly use actors posing emotional expressions, assuming they closely reflect real emotions. However, this research challenges this assumption by directly comparing how people perceive posed versus genuine emotional expressions.

Across three large-scale studies involving over 2,400 participants from diverse cultural backgrounds, we found clear differences between perception of posed and genuine emotions. Participants were consistently better at recognizing emotions when the expressions were posed rather than spontaneous. Interestingly, the researchers also discovered a "negativity bias" with posed emotions—negative emotions like anger and sadness were easier to identify than positive emotions like joy or love. In contrast, spontaneous (genuine) expressions showed the opposite effect, with positive emotions being easier to recognize.

These findings suggest that posed and genuine facial expressions are perceived very differently. This has important implications for psychological research and clinical assessments, where posed expressions are commonly used. This research highlights the importance for researchers and practitioners to carefully consider whether results obtained from posed emotions accurately reflect real-world emotional perception.