Express yourself: Facial expression of happiness, anger, fear, and sadness in funding pitches

We build upon theory from evolutionary psychology and emotional expression, including basic emotion theory and the dual threshold model of anger in organizations, to extend knowledge about the influence of facial expressions of emotion in entrepreneurial fundraising. First, we conduct a qualitative analysis to understand the objects of entrepreneurs' facial expressions of four basic emotions in their pitches: happiness, anger, fear, and sadness. This provides a base for our theorizing that the frequency of entrepreneurs' facial expression of each of these emotions exhibits an inverted U-shaped relationship with funding. We also argue that the frequency of changes in entrepreneurs' facial expressions is positively related to funding. We test our predictions with a sample of 489 funding pitches using computer-aided facial expression analysis. Results support inverted U-shaped relationships of the frequency of facial expression of happiness, anger, and fear with funding, but show a negative relationship of sadness with funding. Results further support that the frequency of change in entrepreneurs' facial expressions promotes funding.

Automated summary

The study examines the relationship between facial expressions of happiness, anger, fear, and sadness and entrepreneurial fundraising, finding that frequent expression of happiness, anger, and fear is positively correlated with funding, while frequent expression of sadness is negatively correlated. Additionally, the frequency of changes in entrepreneurs' facial expressions is shown to promote funding.