Who to whom and why: The social nature of emotional mimicry

The goal of this manuscript is to provide support for the notion that emotional mimicry is a social act. For this, I will provide a brief overview of recent developments in the domain of emotional mimicry research. I will present the mimicry in social context model of mimicry and evidence for four predictions that set this theory apart. Specifically, based on a review of the literature on emotional mimicry, I conclude that we do not mimic the specific muscle movements we observe, but rather we mimic what we infer from these movements. Furthermore, emotional mimicry only occurs when the expresser and observer share the intention to affiliate. Hence, we are less likely to mimic strangers and do not mimic people we do not like. Interactions in which affiliative mimicry occurs are perceived as more positive, but interactions in which mimicry is antagonistic as more negative. This supports the three social functions proposed here: Affiliation, Emotional understanding, and Social regulation.