Smile facts for kids
A smile is a look on your face made by moving the muscles around your mouth. You can also smile with your eyes! Smiles usually show happiness. A smile can be real or pretend. But for animals, smiling can mean different things. When animals show their teeth, it might be a sign they are threatening someone. For example, when chimpanzees show their teeth, it can be a sign of fear.
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What Are Dimples?
Dimples are small dents that some people have in their cheeks, especially when they smile. They are inherited, which means they are passed down from parents to children. Dimples happen because of the way the flesh under the skin forms. Some people might only have one dimple on one side of their face.
What is a Duchenne Smile?
There are many kinds of smiles, but researchers are very interested in the Duchenne smile. This special smile involves your eyes. It was named after a French doctor named Guillaume Duchenne. He found that there were two main types of smiles. A Duchenne smile is when your cheeks lift up and create small wrinkles around your eyes. Many experts believe that a Duchenne smile is hard to fake, making it a sign of true happiness.
Smiles on the Internet
On the Internet, you can "type" a smile! These are usually called smileys, smiley faces, or happy faces. Smileys help people show how they feel when they can't see each other in real life. Smileys typed on a computer are known as emoticons. The way smileys are typed can be different depending on where the person is from.
- Western Style: :-), :-(, ;-), :-O, :-D, (;D)
- Eastern Style: d(^.^)b, \(^o^)/, >.<, ^_^, *<):)
Related Topics
Images for kids
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In her Self-portrait with her daughter Julie (1786), Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun painted herself smiling.
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In the late 1800s and early 1900s, photos often didn't show people smiling. But this photo, Eating Rice, China, shows a smiling Chinese man.
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Women from different cultures smiling.
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A chimpanzee "smiling" at Zoo Knoxville.
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See also
In Spanish: Sonrisa para niños
