Guillaume Duchenne -Science of Electrophysiology

Guillaume Duchenne -Science of Electrophysiology

In 1862, French neurologist Guillaume Duchenne wanted to test the popular theory that the face was directly linked to the soul. He had already done some work applying electric shocks to patients’damaged muscles and he reasoned that if he could apply electric currents to a subject’s face he could stimulate the muscles and photograph the results. One problem was that while it was easy to activate physical responses with electric shocks, most people relaxed immediately the jolt had passed through, too quickly for a camera to record it. One of the patients at the hospital where Duchenne worked was a shoemaker suffering Bell’s Palsy. A of the manifestations of the disease was facial paralysis, which meant the shoemaker would hold his expression for a few minutes after receiving the electro-shock treatment; long enough that is for the photographer to record his expression.

Duchenne subjected the shoemaker to over 100 sessions, applying electrodes to various parts of his face to extract the gamut of emotions. Meanwhile, Paul Tournachon, brother of the famous Felix Nadar, snapped away. The results were published in The Mechanism of Human Physiognomy (Mecanisme de la physionomie Humaine). If the photographs look horrific you have to imagine what the poor shoemaker endured. Still, something good came out of the experiments. Duchenne was able to determine that when a person expressed a genuine smile particular muscles were activated. In physiology the authentic smile is called the Duchenne smile. People who don’t use these muscles when they smile may be showing symptoms of sociopathy.

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