You prepared thoroughly for a presentation at work, and now you’re dropping wisdom to a packed room. Much as you expected, your colleagues appear wowed and fascinated—except for a guy in the front row. He looks confused. Mid-sentence, you try flashing him your megawatt smile, but he just seems more perplexed, maybe even a bit angry. Your voice falters.[time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”]Yes, guy-in-front-row may detest you. More likely, though, you’ve just encountered what some psychologists and body-language experts call RBF, or “resting bothered face.” (An edgier term is used in internet meme-parlance.) It’s a facial expression the owner thinks is neutral, while others view it as irritated or disapproving.Misreading facial expressions isn’t trivial. It’s part of a deeper issue: increasingly, people feel misunderstood. They’re finding it harder to communicate authentically, resulting in isolation and alienation that can undermine mental and physical health.But learning how to get a better read on other people’s facial expressions can help improve your communication and relationships.Why people misjudge facial expressionsMisreading facial expressions may stem from unrealistic expectations we have for others, as well as differences in how individuals and cultures outwardly express themselves and interpret facial cues.Humans are inherently quite good at noticing changes in other people’s expressions. “We can identify every single minute movement,” says Aleix Martinez, an entrepreneur and former Ohio State University professor of cognitive science who used to work as a senior principal scientist at Amazon. However, we’re less skilled at grasping the meaning behind these changes. “We fail, many times, at identifying the affect or emotion being communicated,” Martinez says. If only humans kept their expressions to cartoonishly clear frowns and smiles. In reality, dozens of expressions blend emotions in unique ways. And these subtleties, called micro- or meso-expressions, vary from one culture to the next, as well as among individuals within each culture.Read More: Can Creatine Keep Your Brain Sharp?With all of this nuance, it’s risky to assume you know someone’s feelings based on fleeting looks. “Most of the time, we’re just making the best possible guess,” says Marc Brackett, founding director of Yale’s Center for Emotional Intelligence and author of two books on the topic, Permission to Feel and Dealing with Feeling.These disconnects may be widening in the Internet era—especially as the identities we portray on social media diverge from our true personalities, says Vanessa Van Edwards, a science communicator who wrote the book Captivate: The Science of Succeeding with People. If people see digital-you laughing while cartwheeling down the beach with a crowd of besties, they assume you’re extroverted, even if you’re an introvert who’ll never do public cartwheels again. Meeting in person, they could perceive your neutral face as resting bothered face, compared to your Internet personality. “This makes it even harder to interact in person,” Van Edwards says. “You have so many more misinterpretations.”In teaching a class at Harvard University on social interaction in 2025, Van Edwards surveyed her students about why they feel misunderstood. They shared various reasons—but no one disputed the question’s underlying assumption. Everyone felt misunderstood. And when we lack strong social connection, it can harm well-being, heart health, and longevity.Add the missing contextPart of the problem is how rarely people get to know one another beyond superficialities—even when they interact frequently. As a result, we’re missing critical background that would explain those seemingly out-of-nowhere eyebrow arches and nose crinkles. “If you don’t have quality relationships, you don’t know that person’s baseline of expressions,” Brackett says.Work is a prime example. “At your job, your employer may misinterpret your expression because they have no idea who you are,” Martinez says. “It doesn’t matter how many years you’ve worked there. They don’t have the details of your life.”Van Edwards was recently excited to interview a job candidate only to encounter the person’s resting bothered face throughout the conversation. A follow-up interview went better, and Van Edwards learned the candidate had been grimacing through the pain of wearing borrowed shoes that were too tight. Read More: Lights Are Brighter Than Ever. Is That Bad for Your Eyes?More enduring pieces of context are life history and personality. Researchers have found that adults who faced abuse during childhood are quicker to detect negative emotions than those without such trauma. In addition, people who are prone to anger or are more likely to interpret neutral facial expressions as negative, and those with more stress and negative emotions have higher sensitivity to negative faces.Getting to know such backgrounds can help make face-reading more accurate. After his partner of 30 years talks with his mother on the phone, Brackett knows the topic of their conversation just by glancing at his face. “The closer your relationship, the better you read true emotions,” he says.But people are hard-pressed to find any time, let alone 30 years, to scratch these interpersonal surfaces, Brackett explains. It can seem awkward to ask how an acquaintance is feeling; it’s emotionally safer to ignore their resting bothered face, Brackett says. This shows up in our expressions, non-verbal behavior, and words. “People want to interact with others who are nonjudgmental, good listeners, and compassionate, including warm facial expressions,” Brackett notes. Yet he’s found these types of supportive relationships are often lacking; for instance, only about half of us have them with work colleagues.How to better express yourselfAt this point, you may be reflecting on what, exactly, your facial expressions are communicating to the world. Experts recommend several steps for self-discovery and improvement. One rather uncomfortable option is to “self-audit,” as Van Edwards puts it, by watching a video of yourself. Record a real video call with others, and then monitor your expressions. What messages are sent by your face?Another self-audit strategy is to ask others for feedback. “This is very hard for some because it feels like an attack on their character,” Brackett says. “Others adopt ‘learner mode’ because they really want to show up for others in the way that’s most helpful.” Read More: Should You Shower in the Morning or at Night?If you find out you have resting bothered face, Van Edwards thinks you don’t necessarily need to try to banish it, especially if the expression helps you concentrate and process information. Just be aware so you can verbally clarify it, she suggests. When grimacing in deep thought, you could tell your conversational partner, “let me just process this for a second.” They’ll know to disregard what otherwise might be perceived as anger.To further soften a resting bothered face, use positive body language such as good eye contact—which research shows can lead to a positive reaction—and nodding. Tilting your head toward another person indicates attentiveness and eagerness. Van Edwards has worked with leaders who wear cold and intimidating expressions, yet they wonder why their employees avoid them. “You can balance these cues with warmth,” she says.Above all else, use these adjustments to better express how you really feel. “Fakery backfires,” Van Edwards says. “You have to be genuine.”Decoding other people’s facial expressionsThe problem of misreading facial expressions is a two-way street; it’s both an expresser and an observer issue. Certain skills can be developed to more accurately grasp what facial cues actually mean. We can become more knowledgeable about subtle expressions. For example, look for the lower-lid flex to distinguish whether a person (such as front-row guy) is irritated or just concentrating on what you’re saying, Van Edwards says. When people are concentrating, they harden their lower eyelid; the area under the eye appears to firm up. If someone is genuinely irritated, you’re unlikely to see this.Read More: The Surprising Health Benefits of Spicy FoodIn general, you want to focus on the other person’s eyes. In addition to building mutual feelings of connection, eye gazing can improve your “decoding ability,” Van Edwards says. We tend to monitor the lips to detect certain emotions like joy, but the mouth may be misleading. (People often misinterpret a look of contempt as a half-smile, for example.) Research shows eye contact is key to satisfying social interactions and activates social parts of the brain.It might sound obvious, but the best way to practice reading other people is to get more in-person experience with other human beings. Martinez says he learned to read others’ faces at Amazon while spending most of his days interacting with employees. “These are skills you have to develop,” he says.And give people the benefit of the doubt. If you think you see resting bothered face, keep watching to get more face data, Martinez says. Small samples of expressions won’t reveal much about others’ feelings. “It’s a dynamic system,” Martinez explains, with constant corrections for initial misinterpretations. “We understand expressions better with more information.” Eventually, you may notice the sour face isn’t unique to you or what you’re saying. But if you’re still perceiving displeasure and irritation, you can always ask the other person if everything is okay. “So what’s up with the stink eye?” isn’t your best option. Do it in the spirit and tone of compassion rather than confrontation.Or simply let it go, Martinez says. “Ninety percent of the time, there’s a reason behind the negative expression that’s completely unrelated to whatever you think it means.”