From a young age, we are taught to read and recognize emotions through facial expressions. In the preschool classroom, in the doctor’s office, and on humorous T-shirts, we decipher diagrams that pair each emotion with its correlated facial expression. But humans and animals are not the only faces that we’ve learned to read—we gauge the expressions of cars, too. When we creatively identify faces in the headlights and grille of each car we encounter, we identify its assumed emotion. For example, the Porsche 911’s round headlights resemble friendly eyes (the educational childhood posters have trained us for this: we categorize the vehicle as peppy), while the Lamborghini Huracan EVO’s furrowed and slit-like headlights lend it the illusion of a menacing glare (angry, one would presume). The Volkswagen Beetle A5 smiles amiably, the Mazda MX-5 Miata NA is open-mouthed with mild surprise, and the Lotus Eletre scowls. (And the distinguished Fisker Karma rocks a mustache, which isn’t quite an emotion, but it’s worth mentioning!) Although this facial recognition skill that humans have honed is certainly entertaining on long road trips, what’s the use of it? Why, exactly, would we deduce that cars have faces in the first place?

Cars do not have faces—why do we think they do? 

To begin, this phenomenon is known as pareidolia: the human tendency to see facial features in objects that do not, in fact, have faces. A few objects that pareidolia is manifested in include cars, electrical outlets, and the moon (like the man or rabbit in the moon—search either up, and you’re met with crude drawings outlining lunar craters). An evolutionary trait, pareidolia was developed with the innate intention to recognize and react to potential threats, such as the faces of predators hidden in the shadows. Moreover, in a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the area of the brain involved in facial recognition is activated when auto experts look at the fronts of cars. Fast-forward to modern day: in spite of pareidolia’s harrowing origins, it’s quite evident that it is now being used for purposes far more useful—like shaping the automobile industry! Indeed, the design of vehicles are directly related to the preferences of its audience and their pareidolia brains, which may explain the uptick of vexed vehicles in recent years. 

Why are modern cars so angry?

Perhaps they’re squinting against the wind, or perhaps, a scientific study conducted by Truls Thorstensen has officially proved that people prefer cars to appear “dominant, masculine, and angry”—naturally leading car brands to produce dominant, masculine, and angry cars. In Thorstensen’s study, 20 men and 20 women were asked to assess cars and evaluate traits such as “maturity, sex, attitudes, emotions, and personality” on sliding scales. Following this, study participants identified any facial features they saw on the cars, then answered whether they liked each passenger car or not. Overwhelmingly, the study found that participants preferred cars with “power” traits, such as a lower or wider build and “slit-like or angled headlights with a wider air intake.” 

On the flip side, the overshoot of aggression in modern cars’ facial expressions may call for a rise of more cheerful cars in the coming years. This is especially true in the case of self-driving vehicles, whose makers may opt for a friendlier look to evoke trust in their buyers. For instance, Google’s self-driving prototype has alert and friendly headlights and indents resembling a stretched smile. In addition, despite the acclaim for cars that have awoken on the wrong side of bed, happier cars still have a special place in many’s hearts, as seen with the popular Jaguar E-Type.