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Carney Landis (January 11, 1897 - March 5, 1962) was an American psychologist, author and researcher. He was the Chief Research Psychologist at the New York State Psychiatric Institute and Hospital from 1930 until his death. Landis is primarily known for his Facial Expression Experiment in 1924, in which he studied specific, universal expressions for disgust or shock.

Biography

Carney Landis was born in West Alexandria, Ohio on January 11, 1897, into a Christian family. He briefly attended Carnegie Institute of Technology before going to Ohio State University. There he studied Psychology and earned a Bachelor of Arts in 1921 followed by a Masters of Arts from Dartmouth College in 1922 while teaching Psychology. He then attended University of Minnesota where he got a Ph.D. in 1924. That same year he became known for his Facial Expression Experiment.

After his experiment, from 1924 to 1926, he was a National Research Council Fellow for two years and went to the University of London for a year. Landis stayed in England for the next four years. In 1926 he became assistant professor of Psychology at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut, and was promoted to be the associate professor in 1928.

In 1930, Landis ended his stay in England after being invited to work as a Research Associate at the New York State Psychiatric Institute. He also was a teacher at Columbia University and paid teaching visits to Harvard, the University of Washington and the University of California in Los Angeles. From that point on, he devoted himself to sexual psychopathology while he was a Professor in the department of Psychology at Columbia University.

In 1939, Carney Landis and James D. Page published “Modern Society and Mental Disease”. Their work introduced a new way of interpreting statistics in psychological disorders. In 1940, Landis published “Sex in Development”, where he stated that the disease process plays an important role in psychosis and questioned the notion that it stemmed mainly from developmental causes. Also in the late 1930s, he headed a Committee for Research of Sex-funded research project in which he interviewed 100 women between the ages of 18 and 35 who self-identified as physically disabled. He published the results in 1942 under the title "The Personality and Sexuality of the Physically Handicapped Woman".

During his life, he taught at a lot of different universities, including Harvard University, University of Washington, UCLA, and in South America.

Carney Landis believed that through the empirical method, he could provide answers about unknown scientific phenomena or challenge accepted dogma. His work was therefore based mainly on observation and experience with little regard for theoretical matters. He had a firm insistence on the highest standards of research inquiry and his special ability to work empirically made him an important figure in the movement that Psychology underwent at that time. He was one of the driving forces that supported the shift to empiricism and skepticism. Brian Lesley Weiss provided Landis with the framework for his research, although their views varied greatly. Landis did not agree with Weiss’ dogmatic behaviourist view. He believed that the existence of consciousness and its influence on behaviour was obvious and he aimed at investigating these phenomena as objectively as possible throughout all of his career.

Preliminary study of facial expressions

Historical influences and foundations

Landis was consciously influenced by multiple historical figures. Aristotle’s ‘Physiognomonica’, which outlined the study of facial expression, paved the way for the field of physiognomy. Physiognomy became an independent science and reached its degree of highest popularity during the sixteenth century. In the following two centuries its popularity declined which also contributed to it being regarded as less scientific.

Charles Bell, another influence on Landis, was the first researcher who then attempted to make a scientific link between the workings of the muscles and the production of facial expressions in his work 'Essays on the anatomy of expression in painting'.

One of Landis’ key influences, however, was Charles Darwin who collected the previous findings and merged them in order to push this field of research toward progress. In harmony with his evolutionary theory, Darwin concluded in 'The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals' that facial expressions should be treated phylogenetically, since there are cultural differences regarding the meaning of expressions. Landis disagreed with Darwin, and adjusted this idea by specifying that the application of his theory should only be made for primary emotions, arguing that emotions and expressions of secondary emotions are specific to the individual due to the environment being responsible for forming those.

Landis also mentions Ralph Schulze, who photographically documented facial expressions, as one of his influences. Landis stressed that it should be noted that this study was only of descriptive nature, which is why he felt the need to conduct his own study on this matter.

Set up and method

The problem

The aim of the preliminary experiment (1924) was to record and analyse facial expressions of various people in response to a controlled sequence of situations. These situations were said to be of (roughly) emotional character. The shown expressions were recorded on video or photographed. After the first series of situations, several of the participants were presented with a second series, in which they were asked to voluntarily express the specific facial expressions that were recorded in these situations in the regular experiment. This second sequence served as control (group).

The method

The experiment took place in a laboratory, in which 19 male subjects participated. They were either students or instructors in Dartmouth College. The participant was seated behind a purpose-built table which was placed in the middle of the room. Multiple cameras were hidden in the opposing wall that the participant was facing. The subjects received verbal instructions, which explained that this study was investigating facial expressions. They were asked to simply stay seated and behave as naturally as possible throughout the various situations they would be exposed to. It was requested that they do not try to be emotional, nor to show a “poker face”. After each situation, the subject received a sheet of paper which enumerated a variety of feelings that were likely to be aroused by the situation. For instance, for situation one, the following emotions were named: boredom, abstraction, dreamy, indifference, interest, and the option “Feelings other than those mentioned”.

The following situations were applied as stimuli:

1. Classical music: Phonographic reproduction of “Die Walkure” by Wagner
2. Jazz music: Phonographic reproduction of “My Man” played by a jay orchestra
3. Painting of nudes: “The Birth of Venus” by Bouguereau and “Sleeping Venus” by Giorgione
4. Paintings of Christ: “The Crucifixion” and “The Trinite” by Rubens
5. Vulgar pictures of direct sex appeal: pictures showing various sexual acts
6. Pictures to arouse horror and disgust: “The Disease of China” by Jefferys and Maxwell
7. Odours: eight different bottles filled with various liquids including smells such as cinnamon oil, peppermint, etc.; one bottle labelled “Syrup of Lemon” but containing strong ammonia
8. Living Frogs: subject had to blindly hold their hand into bucket that contained two frogs
9. Electric shock: unexpectedly administered and moderately strong

For each stimulus, the subject was given instructions but was then left alone for the actual situation. After all nine stimuli had been conducted, three subjects, who had shown expressive responses in the initial trials, were recruited for the voluntary expression of (1) Abstraction and Contemplation; (2) “Pep” and Interest; (3) Lust; (4) Religious feelings; (5) Disgust and Repulsion; (6) Pain and Fear.

Results and conclusion

Landis’s conclusions, illustrated in a series of photos, motion picture images, and detailed descriptions in the study, were that facial expressions tended to be fairly similar across subjects to similar stimuli. These stimuli included classical music, jazz music, paintings of nudes, religious imagery, erotica, images of disgust and repulsion, odors, frogs, and electric shock. Emotional affect and expression generally were congruent, though subjects did not always term their emotions similarly. Emotions described and expressions registered were broken down into component parts in analysis, for example, exposure to a nude figure in art might arouse a combination of awe, art appreciation, and sexual arousal. In his “check,” or control group, he also registered that subjects made expressions significantly different when asked to repeat what they assumed their expression had been to some stimuli compared to what it was. Whether this was that people in general are bad at making expressions that they think align with specific emotions or that the control subjects were just approximating emotions they had seen on others when supposedly imagining their own was not determined. It was determined that some emotions, like that of religious reverence, were particularly difficult to approximate if not actually experienced, and that the feeling of pain was rarely approximated at anything like the intensity when actual pain is being felt.

Similar studies

Around that time, other studies were being led and were used as supportive documents by Landis. In 1914, Feleky’s study “The expression of the emotions" aimed to illustrate the expressive movements characteristic of certain emotional states by showing pictures portraying different emotions to 100 individuals that had to match the picture to an emotion from a list.

In 1918 Herbert Langfeld published “ The judgment of emotions from facial expressions" where he tested 6 subject’s ability to judge emotions by looking at pictures during various trials. He also published “Judgments of facial expression and suggestion” where subjects had to agree or disagree with the emotion assigned to pictures of faces.

Impact

Landis did have a quite significant impact during his career. His works and discoveries were appreciated by his colleagues, in particular in the fields of early experimental psychology, psychosurgery, pharmacology and more. William A. Hunt said:"The influence of Landis' work probably is likely to have been more widely felt among his generation than will be noted in history." Research done by Landis had also impacted the development of the new way of statistical interpretation of data on mental disorders.

Criticism

In his facial expression study Landis broke one of the later established APA regulations regarding ethics in psychological research. He did not explain to the participants what they were going to experience. He showed them some disturbing pictures, including intense pornography scenes and explicit pictures of severe skin conditions as well as making the subjects put hands into a jar with slimy frogs, without their prior knowledge or consent.

The experiment he conducted with Mary Marjorie Bolles and published under the title "The Personality and Sexuality of the Physically Handicapped Woman" had received some criticism as well. It regarded keeping significant data secret by either 'softening' the relations given by women or by straight up censoring and cutting out some claims made by their subjects. It falls under manipulation of data and any conclusions they could have produced based on information they made public could not be accounted as reliable.

Publications (selection)

• Studies in the dynamics of behavior, 1932
• Modern society and mental disease, 1938
• The startle pattern, 1939
• Sex in Development, 1940
• Personality and Sexuality of the physically handicapped woman, 1942
• Textbook of Abnormal Psychology, 1947
• Varieties of psychopathological experiences, 1964