e visual communication can be. Through skillful manipulation of emotions and attitudes, the visual message can send waves of sadness, joy, desire, hunger, or excitement to an all to willing audience (Plegens, 1991, pp. 46 52).
Visual nonverbal communication is often the summation of the way that humans transmit information on both a conscious and subconscious level (Sears, et.al., 1989, p. 80). In the field of social psychology, studies on visual nonverbal communication are extremely important since they help define the distinction between personal expressive and standard communicative actions in the entire process of communication. This, of course, has strong implications for the therapist, researcher, and lay person alike (Mahl, 1987).
The human visual system consists of the five parts of the eyeballs; the muscles which move the eyeballs within rounded skill cavities, otherwise known as the orbits; the protective eyelids; the optic nerve, which connects the eyes to the brain; and the brain, which perceives the visual images and decides the response the body will make to visual information. The human eyeball is capable of free movement in every direction except laterally. Humans can look upward easily, whereas most animals need to use the neck and lift the head to do so. Six muscles, four straight and two oblique, are connected to the eyeball and allow its movement. Within the eyeball, the electromagnetic radiation (light) is transformed by photosensitive receptor cells into energy to which the brain can respond. A little more than half the eyeball resides within the bony cavity of the orbit well protected from outside force. Light enters the eye through the cornea and then passes through a pocket of salty liquid, the aqueous humor, which nourishes the cornea and the lens. Between the cornea and the lens is the usually pigmented iris, acting as a window shade responding automatically to the amount of available light...