Abstract: Cross-cultural researches on facial expression show more evidences of cultural consistency and differences currently. These researches focus on spontaneous facial expressions and recognition, the effect of in-group advantage and on asymmetry of emotional information in upper and lower facial expressions. Researchers use dialect theory, chinese folk model and EMPATH to explain the results of cross-cultural studies on facial expression in different perspectives. In terms of effective factors, display rules, decoding rules and effects of language are very important and controversial. Future researches should do more exploration on the asymmetry of emotional information in upper and lower facial expressions and on effective factors.

Key words: spontaneous facial expression, in-group advantage effect, cross-cultural study on facial expression, display rules, decoding rules