and as more unfriendly that non-smiling men. The results support previous studiesthat suggest that women are socially expected to smile more than men and are viewedmore unfavorably if they do not exhibit the behavior. Briton and Hall (1995) studied the differences between men and women and found thatmen are typically believed to be more aggressive, noisy and dominant whereas women arebelieved to be more gentle, emotional and sensitive to others needs. These perceptions areaccompanied by expected nonverbal behavior. Men are expected to fold their arms, makeoccasional eye contact and dominate the conversation. Women are expected to touch,smile, lean forward and be more submissive during conversations. Most research studying gender differences in smiling have found similar results, thatwomen smile more often during verbal interaction than men. Other studies indicate thatthis difference may occur because of the social expectations placed on men and women. The purpose of the present study was to investigate, using a naturalistic observation, ifthere are gender differences in smiling. Taking into consideration the results fromprevious studies done on this topic, I hypothesized that females will smile more often thanmen during verbal interaction.MethodParticipants Sixty-four participants were part of a convenient sample for this study. Thirty-three ofthe participants were females and the remaining 31 were males. Estimated age of theparticipants ranged from 16-51, with the average age being 26.1. There was nodiscrimination of participants by age or race.Setting The naturalistic observation took place at Ruby Tuesday’s, The great American Cafeand the food court, all located at the Madison Square Mall, on randomly chosen days andtimes. The observer was seated in an obscure place that did not infringe on theparticipants environment.Materials A data sheet was used to collect information that identified estimate...
