Introduction

The drill commands, Left/Right/About “Face!” trigger tactics of intimidation used by military and police forces around the world to manage civil strife. Upon command, armed, uniformed troops poised at attention with gazes thrust forward and chins slightly tucked, synchronously pivot in a common direction. Moving into line formation, they present a wall of expressionless faces toward the unruly protestors they seek to control. Their still faces are mostly male and angulated with adult bone structure. They project formidability and dominance, orchestrated to signal overwhelming force (Martin, 1999; U.S. Army Field Manual, 2005).Footnote 1

Across the divide, unarmed protestors use a different facial strategy. A common, nonviolent tactic is to pack the front line with young women who reach out to the armed forces, smiling and offering flowers (Nikolayenko, 2012). These resisters are oval-faced and large-eyed. They appear approachable and vulnerable, too innocent and harmless to shoot. Their faces transmit appeasement messages that proffer influence of a disarming sort: the “face” drill for trained, nonviolent resisters is choreographed to stop bullets from flying (see, e.g., http://psych.colgate.edu/~ckeating/AboutFaceFig1.html). They know that when threat is faced by threat, violence tends to break out and resisters lose the power of the moral high ground (Ackerman & Duvall, 2005).

It is stunning, really: during times of intense human conflict some faces are dispatched to threaten lives and others to save them. Even during mundane power struggles between individuals, faces are deployed to alarm and disarm, threaten and appease, and repulse and beguile. These are the signal dualities leaders rely upon to be successful.Footnote 2 Effective leaders exude dominance, thereby enhancing their distinctiveness as social focal points and elevating the leadership role to make it hard to challenge (Liberman & Trope, 2014; Shamir, 1995, 2013; Smith & Trope, 2006). But charismatic leaders also attract others so they come to identify with the leader, the collective, and the collective goal (Epitropaki, Kark, Mainemelis, & Lord, 2017; Haslam, Reicher, & Platow, 2011). Wielding the dual nature of this long, psychological reach requires the push-pull projections of power and vulnerability, separateness and sameness, and distance and approachability (Antonakis & Jacquart, 2013; Kark, Shamir, & Chen, 2003; Keating, 2011; Shamir, 1995, 2013). To be perceived as charismatic, leaders must, in a sense, balance both kinds of “face” drills in relationship to followers. Charisma “resides in the relationship between leaders who exhibit certain charismatic qualities and behaviors and those followers who have certain perceptions, emotions, and attitudes toward the leader, the group led by the leader, and the vision advocated by the leader” (Howell and Shamir, 2005: p. 98). Much of this relationship is shaped by effective nonverbal communication (Darioly & Schmid Mast, 2014; Reh, Van Quaquebeke, & Giessner, 2017; Riggio, 2006).

These ideas extend the Status Cues Theory of nonverbal communication to charismatic leadership (Keating, 1985, 2002, 2011). It is an approach framed in modern evolutionary theory and grounded in cross-species/cross-cultural communication patterns uncovered by behavioral scientists from a rich array of fields: animal and human ethology, primatology, psychological science, neuroscience, anthropology, and political science. The status cues approach is compatible with recent theoretical perspectives on the nature of charismatic leadership and social power (i.e., Castelnovo, Popper, & Koren, 2016; Grabo & van Vugt, 2016; Haslam et al., 2011; Kark et al., 2003; Keltner, Gruenfeld, & Anderson, 2003; Reh et al., 2017; Riggio & Riggio, 2010; Shamir, 2013). Here, status cues refer to the signaling behaviors and appearances linked to approach/avoidance motives in actors and perceivers. From the Status Cues perspective, the balanced projection of dual status messages—formidability (dominance, power, and agency) and receptivity (submissiveness, warmth, and communality) and the motives they engender are essential to charismatic leadership.

This chapter highlights the role of the face as a platform for signaling status and projecting leadership qualities. First, Status Cues Theory is elaborated, static (structural) and dynamic (expressive) status cues are identified, and preliminary evidence is described that connects dual status signals to perceptions of charisma. Next, arguments and evidence elucidate how optimal status cue combinations relate to leaders’ gender and race, and to sociopolitical and cultural contexts. We close by reflecting on the implications of human susceptibility to charismatic displays of status cues.

The Status Cues Theory of Face Perception

Status cues are keys to decrypting faces. Status broadly refers to the essential qualities and potentialities of an individual relative to other individuals. Among the essential qualities are age, sex, in-group/out-group identity, and dominance, the latter defined as control over physical and social resources (Hawley, 1999; Rowell, 1974; Schaller, 2008; Wilson, 1975). Status dimensions collaborate; though less true in the far distant, human past, most societies today are characterized by age-graded, male dominance hierarchies (Van Den Berghe & Barash, 1977).

Status signaling systems regulate approach and avoidance, the foundation of social life (Buck & Renfro Power, 2006; Krieglmeyer, Deutsch, De Houwer, & De Raedt, 2010; Strack & Deutsch, 2004) and the essence of social power (Keltner et al., 2003). Status cues help perceivers assess whether or not social interaction goals are likely to be satisfied or thwarted. Quick, probabilistic judgments are made from structural and dynamic facial cues: Friend or foe, giver or taker, immature or mature, potential mate or not? Status cues along the dimensions of age, sex, in-group/out-group identity, and dominance signal receptivity or formidability. Risk and time/energy costs would be high if each option had to be tested (Dawkins & Krebs, 1978; Schaller, 2008). Instead, faces act like traffic police working to prevent costly collisions by directing approach and avoidance at social interchanges.

There is no more important direction to receive than that which occurs along the status dimension of dominance (Buss, 2004; Fiske, 1992; Mazur, 1985; 2005; van Vugt, Hogan, & Kaiser, 2008; Wilson, 1975). From the signalers’ perspective, dominance (formidability) and submissiveness (receptivity) cues provide a way to discourage or invite the approach of others. From the perceivers’ point-of-view, these signals help forecast how avoidance and approach is likely to be received by the signaler. The fact that status signaling has potential benefits for communicator and recipient is a pattern found across species (Dawkins & Krebs, 1978; Mazur, 1985; 2005; Otte, 1974).

Because sensitivity to status information is fundamental to group-living species like our own, dominance detection systems are deeply embedded in human phylogeny and ontogeny. Our nonhuman primate relatives categorize unfamiliar conspecifics based on observations of dominance-related behaviors (e.g., Bovet & Washburn, 2003). Early in development, human infants use behavioral cues to detect and anticipate stable, transitive, dominance relationships (Mascaro & Csibra, 2012). Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data indicate that status relationships are coded in areas of the brain related to numbers (Chiao et al., 2009). The split-second detection of dominance and submissiveness cues from faces shows these processes to be automatic in adults (Moors & De Houwer, 2005). One study found that adults make “threat” judgments of expressionless male faces in under 39 ms, accessing speedy, high priority (i.e., low spatial frequency) perceptual processing channels in the visual system to do it (Bar, Neta, & Linz, 2006). Fast, coarse, information is apparently what the brain uses to detect facial expressions, specifically anger and fear (Maratos, Mogg, Bradley, Rippon, & Senior, 2009), that have been linked to avoidance and approach tendencies, respectively (Marsh, Ambady, & Kleck, 2005). Measurements of event related potentials (ERPs) indicate that threat-related facial expressions are processed early in the brain and trigger collateral, dominance perceptions (Chiao et al., 2008). These diverse lines of research combine to suggest that humans adapted to social life by developing exquisitely sensitive dominance and submissiveness signaling and detection mechanisms in ways meant to energize the approach/avoidance motivational system. For humans, there is urgency to sorting out dominance relationships and the face provides a platform to do it.

Status Cues from Facial Structure

Maturity-related structures of the face are handy carriers of information about how formidable or receptive a social target is likely to be (Keating, 2002). Like the rest of the body, the size and shape of faces and features changes with underlying gonadal maturation (Alley, 1988; Enlow, 1982; Gray, 1948; Gould, 1977; Guthrie, 1969; Konner, 2010). Heads grow in actual size and become less rounded, making eyes appear smaller. Noses and chins become more prominent. Influxes of hormones at puberty square jaws, add definition to cheekbones, and stimulate the growth of facial hair. These and other physiognomic changes signal more than developmental status; they broadcast individual potentialities to control physical and social resources.

Status Cues Theory embraces the position that these developmentally-linked human status cues evolved to operate independently of age (Gould, 1977; Guthrie, 1970; Keating, 1985, 2002). Thus, on any age face, paedomorphic-looking facial traits (e.g., large eyes, thin, arched brows, pudgy lips, and round chins) transmit qualities associated with submissiveness and receptivity, including warmth, weakness, naiveté, honesty, and femininity. On any age face, mature-looking facial characteristics (e.g., narrow eyes, bushy brows, thin lips, and broad, square jaws) elicit attributions associated with dominance and formidability, such as power, strength, competence, cunning, and masculinity (e.g., Keating, 2002; Zebrowitz & Montepare, 1992; Perrett et al., 1998 cf Todorov, Baron, & Oosterhof, 2008). It is the cue that counts, not the age of the face (see Fig. 7.1).

Fig. 7.1
figure 1

Physiognomic status cues are imitated here by changing the sizes and shapes of facial aspects. Actual faces (middle) were digitally manipulated to look more receptive on the left (by making eyes and lips larger, thinning brows, and rounding chins) and to look more formidable on the right (by making eyes smaller, brows thicker, lips thinner, and chin more angular). The ages of these faces are judged similarly but perceptions of dominance and submissiveness are altered in the direction expected by Status Cue Theory

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By driving social perceptions, status cues guide behavioral responses to social targets. For example, adults expect more from mature-looking children than from babyish-looking children of the same age; this difference can be detected in the way adults instruct children with different physiognomies (Zebrowitz, 1997). On the flip side, adults typically treat baby-faced adult defendants as less responsible than mature-faced adults charged with the same transgression (Zebrowitz, 1997). When resumes ostensibly meant to be mailed to an employer were “lost” in public places, good Samaritans in the US and Kenya were more motivated to help by posting them if the attached portrait image of the [presumed] resume-writer displayed submissive-looking, receptive facial cues rather than dominant-looking, formidible ones (Keating, Randall, Kendrick, & Gutshall, 2003). Regardless of the age of a face, dominance cues apparently generated little motivation to help while neotenous, receptivity cues invited cooperative social exchange, resulting in differential treatment.

Decades of research show that physiognomy expresses dominance and leadership. For instance, early, cross-cultural findings for adult perceivers in eight different countries as well as for US preschoolers showed that male and female adults with broad faces and receded hairlines looked dominant; they were disproportionately chosen as people who “tell other people what to do” (Keating & Bai, 1986; Keating, Mazur, & Segall, 1981). Recent studies find that facial width-to-height ratios are associated with perceptions of competence and leadership among corporate leaders, and that corporate profits can be predicted from these measurements and perceptions (Alrajih & Ward, 2014; Rule & Ambady, 2009; Wong, Ormiston, & Haselhuhn, 2011). Moreover, perceivers’ brain responses measured via fMRI correspond to their behavioral-level first impressions of CEOs, and in a test of validity predicted company profits (Rule et al., 2011). Potential causal mechanisms that might underlie these associations include genetics, whereby facial traits are honest signals of behavioral proclivities for leadership, and social influence processes, whereby the appearance of potential produces self-fulfilling prophecies and similar behavioral outcomes.

Status Signals from Facial Expression

The face also evolved the capacity to communicate status from movement of its parts. It is rare when a face is not moving during social exchange. Even infants “know” this: infants become upset when their mothers pose motionless and “expressionless” for purposes of the “Still-face Paradigm” (e.g., Mesman, Linting, Joosen, Bakermans-Kranenburg, & van Ijzendoorn, 2013). To adults, so-called expressionless facial poses are also perceived as threatening (Bar et al., 2006; Moors & De Houwer, 2005) or even “bitchy” when displayed by women (Rogers & Macbeth, n.d.). When it comes to nonverbal communication, faces apparently have no “neutral” gear.

Emotion is one way faces shift into drive. Both Ekman’s Neurocultural Theory of Emotion (Ekman, 1972) and Izard’s Differential Emotions Theory (Izard, 1971) posit that part and parcel of a phenomenological, emotional experience is the unique pattern of facial muscular movements designed to express it. However, functional, ecological perspectives suggest there is less emotion than meets the eye in most facial expressions (Fridlund & Russell, 2006; Keating, 1985, 2002, 2016). Intentions, feelings, and expressions are often unlinked. For instance, do we know whether the troops and resisters shown in this image intended and expressed something they actually felt, or felt something they neither expressed nor intended to act upon: http://psych.colgate.edu/~ckeating/AboutFaceFig1.html? Signaling, not feeling, is what faces do best (Keating, 2016).

Facial movements signal formidability (dominance, aggression, and threat) and receptivity (submissiveness, appeasement, and affiliation) apart from felt emotion. Lowered brows project dominance in the West (Blurton Jones, 1971; Keating, Mazur, Segall, Cysneiros, et al., 1981) and ward off approach (Camras, 1977), whether or not the signaler is feeling angry. The tongue show, whereby the tongue is protruded slightly between closed teeth, also inhibits approach (Smith, 1977). The universal displays of pride and shame incorporate elements of facial dominance and submissiveness signaling (Marten, Tracy, & Shariff, 2012; Tracy, Shariff, Zhao, & Henrich, 2013). Chin thrusts and frowns are dominance signals that work to maintain status (Keating & Heltman, 1994; Ostrov & Keating, 2004). Sometimes, these expressions are reflective of felt anger but mostly they simply signal “beware.”

Similarly, smiling need not reflect the happiness of the expresser to signal appeasement and invite approach. The appeasement function of smiling is widespread. In 11 different national/cultural samples, perceptions of adult submissiveness increased when stimulus targets posed with slight smiles (Keating, Mazur, Segall, Cysneiros, et al., 1981; cf. Hareli, Shomrat, & Hess, 2009). Smiling is a component of pancultural displays of embarrassment and shame, which also serve an appeasement function (Keltner & Buswell, 1997; Tracy & Matsumoto, 2008). The play face, a head back, toothless, open-mouth smile, indicates that what is to follow lacks aggressive intent (van Hooff, 1972). Head tilts and nodding are also common human appeasement gestures (Helweg-Larsen, Cunningham, Carrico, & Pergram, 2004).

Many facial status gestures are similar in form and function to nonhuman primate facial signals. In some cases, they are believed to be homologous (Keating, 1985; Lockard, Fahrenbruch, Smith, & Morgan, 1977; Shariff & Tracy, 2011; Smith, 1977; van Hooff, 1972). Either way, the right combination of formidability and receptivity cues and signals render perceptions of charisma.

Status Information Combines to Appear Charismatic: Preliminary Evidence

If Status Cues Theory has merit, then static and dynamic status information displayed by seasoned leaders should combine to project charismatic blends of formidability and receptivity. Preliminary tests of this proposition were conducted in 2017 by presenting silent, 30 s digital recordings of US Congressional leaders giving speeches on domestic and foreign affairs to an online sample of 364 eligible voters. The leaders (6 males and 4 females, each presenting a domestic and foreign affairs speech) were shown (but not heard) speaking at podiums on the US House or Senate floors. Respondents rated leaders’ charisma, as well as their receptivity (i.e., warmth and attractiveness), formidability (i.e., power and competence), and trustworthiness. Only data from respondents who did not recognize particular leaders were used. Trained coders analyzed each leader’s face and body gestural cues.

When separate, simultaneous regressions were run for each leader (collapsed across speech topics), receptivity and formidability perceptions independently predicted charisma ratings, explaining between 34 and 62 percent of the variance. Receptivity and formidability did not interact, and the inclusion of trustworthiness scores as a predictor in the equation contributed significant prediction for only two of ten leaders. Preliminary analyses showed that the nonverbal facial cues associated with charisma included looking at the audience while speaking, displaying positive affect, and not pouting. Prediction was augmented by body gestures that were frequent, energetic, two-handed, and open-palmed.

Consistent with Status Cues Theory, perceptions of a leader’s charisma from physical appearance and nonverbal behavior was predicted by two, independent, components: one messaging formidability and the other messaging receptivity.

Charismatic Faces in Context

Perceptions of charisma are sensitive to social, economic, historic, and political contexts (Boggild & Laustsen, 2016; Grabo & van Vugt, 2016; Little, Roberts, Jones, & Debruine, 2012). This suggests that optimal, charismatic blends of formidability and receptivity signaling will shift with perceivers’ expectations, fears, and desires—and thus, with gender and racial stereotypes, sociopolitical concerns, and cultural expectations for leadership.

Gender and Race

Dominance cues in the context of cues for race and gender complicate how status is “read” from faces. For example, most researchers find that dominant facial appearances characterize successful CEOs (e.g., Rule & Ambady, 2009; Wong et al., 2011). But one study found successful Black CEOs to be baby-faced (Livingston & Pearce, 2009).Footnote 3 For the White undergraduate perceivers who rated faces, racial stereotypes triggered by African physiognomy likely augmented formidability cues on Black faces; added receptivity (neoteny) cues may have been reassuring. Similarly, perhaps receptivity cues contributed to Black CEO success in the organizational environments Livingston and Pearce (2009) studied.

Female physiognomy also complicates status displays. Similar to other primate species (Koba, Izumi, & Nakamura, 2009), adult human female faces are relatively paedomorphic: they resemble those of juveniles more than do adult male faces (Enlow, 1982; Gould, 1977; Guthrie, 1970). Females tend to have proportionally larger eyes, less prominent brows, more arched eyebrows, more rounded jaws, more gracile noses, fuller lips, and less elongated faces (as reflected in a large eye-mouth-eye angle) relative to adult males (Bruce, Bruce, & Dench, 1993; Danel & Pawlowski, 2007; Ferrario, Sforza, Pizzini, Vogel, & Miani, 1993). Presumably, paedomorphic facial traits were favored by natural selection and retained via neoteny, whereby the gene-directed development of certain facial structures was curtailed as reproductive maturity proceeded (Gould, 1977; Perrett et al., 1998; cf. Konner, 2010; Shea, 1989). Neoteny may have benefitted adult females as paedomorphy did for the truly young by sending status messages that appeased aggression and elicited affiliation and caregiving from kin, mates, and others (Keating, 2002). The appeal of female facial receptivity cues seems universal: Neotenous female faces are perceived as attractive in Western and nonwestern cultures (Jones, 1995).

Sexually dimorphic physiognomic cues would seem to present a basic dilemma for perceiving females as leaders. Leadership roles are construed in typically masculine terms, connoting agency more than communality, masculinity more than femininity, and assertiveness and ambitiousness more than kindness and modesty (Koenig, Eagly, Mitchell, & Ristikari, 2011). How do perceivers resolve the conscious and nonconscious nonverbal conundrum of attributing leadership to females whose faces signal submissiveness and approachability?

A simple priming experiment demonstrated how insidious status appraisals from physiognomy can be for female leaders (Keating, 2011). Portrait images of the four most masculine-looking men and the four most feminine-looking women from the US Congressional Class of 2009 were used as primes (Study 1). Shown below the level of awareness, these images preceded person-related descriptors related to formidability (e.g., confident, leader, and strong) or receptivity (e.g., vulnerable, loser, and weak) intermingled with control descriptors of houses (e.g., drafty, brick, and furnished). Undergraduate participants were instructed to respond as quickly as possible when the descriptor could describe a person. As predicted, subliminal primes of female compared to male Congressional leaders’ faces slowed reaction times between “Person” and power-related traits. Moreover, the power disadvantage in the wake of female face primes was similar for participants given agentic versus communal descriptions of leadership beforehand. Though complementary findings for weakness-related traits failed to emerge, feminine faces left female politicians at an implicit power disadvantage similar to the way female names do (Rudman & Kilianski, 2000; Scott & Brown, 2006).

Identifying charismatic combinations of status cues for female leaders is difficult not simply because of sexually dimorphic physiognomies. Facial gestures typical of females also signal approach and submissiveness more than power and dominance (Bruce, Bruce, & Dench, 1993; Bulygina, Mitteroecker, & Aiello, 2006; Carli, LaFleur, & Loeber, 1995). Though differences can be slight, females tend to smile and nod more, and show less visual dominance, than do men (Dovidio, Ellyson, Keating, Heltman, & Brown, 1988; Helwig-Larsen, Cunningham, Carrico, & Pergram, 2004; LaFrance, Hecht, & Paluck, 2003). Moreover, gender role expectations modify social status information processing (Eagly & Karau, 2002). Traditional gender roles for females put a premium on receptivity, not formidability, and formidable females are often perceived as unattractive and unlikeable (e.g., Braun, Peus, & Frey, 2012; Butler & Geis, 1990; Eagly & Karau, 2002; Henley, 1977; Phelan & Rudman, 2010; Rudman & Glick, 2001). What happens, then, when physiognomic and gestural status messages collide with leadership roles for females?

We tested how combinations of nonverbal status cues impacted voter impressions of female leaders by digitally altering still images of the faces and gestural poses of two Black and two White US Congresswomen (Keating, 2011). Faces were made to look more or less neotenous, and head and body poses conveyed either submissiveness or dominance. Four-hundred and four predominantly White eligible US voters rated different combinations of the face/body composites for leadership qualities. They perceived White females to have more leadership qualities when power cues were paired with signs of approach/submissiveness, the most potent combination being neotenous faces paired with dominance gestures. Black females were perceived as more powerful overall, and status cue combinations made no difference to perceptions of their formidability. Both Black and White leaders were perceived as more appealing (warm, attractive) when displaying neotenous features and submissive poses. Thus, gender stereotypes seemed to have constrained leadership evaluations for White women more than for Black. Cultural images of strong Black women perhaps allowed perceivers greater latitude in recognizing signs of Black female leadership.

Although more characteristic of female than male faces, neoteny drives character attributions in consistent ways. Across White, Black, and Asian adults of either sex and any age , facial neoteny (or babyishness) cues approachability, submissiveness, dependence, weakness, naiveté, honesty, and warmth (Montepare & Zebrowitz, 1998; Zebrowitz, Montepare, & Lee, 1993). Perhaps because adult females are relatively more likely to exhibit them, neotenous physiognomic cues are also considered “feminine” and conjure impressions of “feminine” traits and a lack of leadership competence (Perrett et al., 1998; Rhodes, 2006; Sczesny & Kühnen, 2004; Sczesny, Spreemann, & Stahlberg, 2006; Spisak, Homan, Grabo, & van Vugt, 2012). White males with neotenous facial cues can pay a price: when presented as leaders, they received lower competency ratings than males with maturity-enhanced features who gestured submissively, and in comparison to females of any face/behavior combination (Keating, 2002). In these cases, white male leaders were constrained by gender stereotypes requiring them to appear and act formidable, not receptive.

That said, dynamic and physiognomic receptivity cues sometimes contribute status information uniquely beneficial to leaders. Neotenous cues are routinely added to the drawn, digitized, sculpted, or actual faces of harsh-looking leaders in order to exude approachability and likeability, and to make aging leaders appear closer to their prime (Keating, 2006). These cues also signal trustworthiness (Keating, 2002) and are potent enough to alter perceptions of recognizable leaders. An experimental test of this idea was carried out by digitally altering the faces of well-known US Presidents (Keating, Randall, & Kendrick, 1999). When the image of President Bill Clinton’s face was surreptitiously manipulated to increase neoteny, perceivers who saw this version of his face attributed more honesty to him, even as the Monica Lewinsky scandal unfolded. Perceivers did not notice any changes to the sitting president’s face. The right status cue at the right time can be effective in altering character judgments under the radar of conscious awareness.

Sociopolitical and Cultural Contexts

There is an art to deploying status cues in different sociopolitical and cultural contexts and some science to back it up. The “art” requires sensitivity to situation; formidability and receptivity signals are differently effective depending on historical, economic, political, and cultural contexts. In peacetime leaders with more less dominant, feminine, facial appearances are preferred; in wartime, preferences gravitate toward leaders with dominant, masculine visages (van Vugt & Grabo, 2015). In times of corporate upheaval, perceivers prefer CEO candidates with dominant faces (Wong et al., 2011). When economic times are tough even ideas of beauty shift in favor of taller, heavier, and more physically formidable female models (Pettijohn & Jungeberg, 2004). Charisma, like beauty, resides to some degree in the eyes of beholders whose sight changes with circumstance.

Seasoned leaders are successful because they tailor their nonverbal status displays to fit the “eyes” or motives of beholders, their constituents. In their 30 s thin slices, for example, the congressional leaders we studied revealed more nonverbal warmth cues when speaking about domestic issues and more power cues when speaking about foreign affairs. They seemed to anticipate followers’ greater need for receptivity when speaking about government as caregiver (e.g., the economy and health care), and greater desire for formidability displays when speaking about government as protector (e.g., threats from terrorists and illegal immigration). Results like these reinforce the idea that charisma is the performance of the leader/follower relationship, not simply a trait some leaders possess.

Culture also shifts the formula for perceptions of charisma from nonverbal status cues. In cultures where power distance between leaders and followers is traditional, expected, and valued (Hoftstedt, 1984, 2001), nonverbal cues for leader formidability should weigh relatively more heavily than cues for receptivity. An online, cross-national study of perceptions of female leaders lends some support for the idea. Senior research student Solhee Bae collected data from 241 South Korean respondents, where power distance is highly valued, and from 211 US respondents, where power distance is less valued. Survey instructions and items were back-translated for Koreans. Participants (all of voting age) were first primed by being asked to indicate on a sliding scale the level of national crisis they perceived. Then they watched silent, 30 s thin slices of two US and two Korean leaders (actually actresses) delivering remarks on a stage ostensibly in front of an audience. The actresses enacted face and body gestural scripts for dominance (direct gaze, brow frowns, no smiling, arms akimbo, and finger pointing) and for submissiveness (lowered gaze, raised brows, smiles, hand clasp, and elbow clasp). Unbeknownst to the actresses, the make-up applied by a technician to their faces either enhanced or reduced the appearance of neoteny and therefore, receptivity (see Fig. 7.2). Thirty-second digital recordings were made of each actress in each make-up condition (neoteny versus reduced neoteny) as they performed each gestural script.

Fig. 7.2
figure 2

Examples of the make-up techniques used to reduce (Column A) or enhance (Column B) the appearance of neoteny and receptivity of female faces. Eyeliner, eye pencil, mascara, foundation, powder, blush, and lipstick were applied to make brows thick or thin and arched, lashes thin or thick and long, cheeks and chin more angular or round, complexion less or more smooth, and lips thin or full, respectively

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Respondents saw each actress perform one face/gesture combination. They judged charisma (essentially the same word in English and Korean), and then responded to other trait scales (back-translated for Koreans) measuring formidability and receptivity. Overall, face and body status gestures, rather than make-up manipulations, had the greatest impact on perceived formidability and receptivity. Next, perceptions along these dual dimensions were used to predict charisma. For US perceivers, formidability and receptivity independently predicted charisma for Korean and US female leaders. For Korean perceivers, only formidability did, suggesting that Koreans prioritized status signals consistent with power distance in leaders. These contrasting national patterns may have been augmented by political events, especially in Korea. There, the survey launched in the spring of 2017 as impeachment of the country’s female president concluded and as the North stoked nuclear tensions. A heightened sense of crisis evident among our Korean respondents may have provoked a greater psychological desire for leader formidability than usual.

Summary and Implications

Perceptions of charismatic leadership depend upon the ability to deploy dual nonverbal status messages. These dual messages incorporate nonverbal messages of formidability (dominance, power, and competence) and receptivity (submissiveness, warmth, and attractiveness), and evoke motives to both maintain distance (avoid) and approach. Because charisma is an outcropping of leader/follower relationships, the optimal balance of status cues shifts with historical contexts, current conditions, and follower beliefs and states. Optimal expression through these channels requires, from leaders, sensitivity to the states and social motives of perceivers so as to project at times more formidability than receptivity and at other times, the reverse.

No wonder, then, that status signals provide only more or less “honest” credentials. The most informative signals are those hardest or costliest to fake (Dawkins & Krebs, 1978). The truth is, most can be feigned when not stringently vetted, which is why the art of the bluff is maintained in many species (Otte, 1974; Wallace, 1973). Humans are no exception: displays of overconfidence and even narcissism can secure actual status (e.g., Anderson, Brion, Moore, & Kennedy, 2012; Back, Schmuckle, & Egloff, 2010). Moreover, behaviors that perceivers believe signal dominance and those that actually do are not wholly the same (Hall, Coats, & LeBeau, 2005). Nevertheless, perception counts in leadership as in life. But whether genuine or fake, emergent, charismatic leaders project distinct, nonverbal signatures that children and adults respond to at varying levels of awareness (e.g., Cogsdill, Todorov, Spelke, & Banaji, 2014; Keating & Heltman, 1994; Ko, Sadler, & Galinsky, 2015; Rozin & Kark, 2013; Stein, 1975; Tiedens & Fragale, 2003; Todorov, Mandisodza, Goren, & Hall, 2005; Tracy & Matsumoto, 2008).

Susceptibility to charismatic performances is a double-edged sword. It empowers group members as it generates dependence on leaders (Haslam et al., 2011; Hogg, 2016; Kark et al., 2003). In coming decades, inequality and climate change will likely fuel conditions favoring charismatic leaders in corporate, political, religious, and other organizations. Which face of power will attract us is less clear as leadership doesn’t always arrive at the front lines of social change the way we expect it will.