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Glite Dictionary
facial muscle

facial muscle

3 3.3
A part of the face that moves skin to make expressions
  • noun
  • /ˈfeɪʃəl ˈmʌsəl/
  • Specialized
translation icon : músculo facial
  • When she smiled widely, the movement of her facial muscles was evident to everyone around her.
  • facial muscle activity

It influences and is influenced by facial muscles.

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Examples

  • Open your mouth and relax your jaw and facial muscles.

    Academic text (1996)

  • Kissing requires a total of 34 facial muscles and 112 postural muscles.

    Hanna (2011)

  • The positive effects of this treatment for facial muscles are well described.

    Academic text (2004)

  • What if she lost control of her facial muscles?

    Fiction book (1992)

  • Cats don't have as many facial muscles as dogs do.

  • The demands that this attempt made on his facial muscles gave rise to faint twitches all over.

    Fiction book (1996)

  • I could see her facial muscles tense as the door chime sounded, and I wanted to help her.

    Fiction book (1999)

  • The facial-feedback hypothesis states that the brain uses feedback from facial muscles to recognize emotions that are being experienced.

    Blog text (9)

  • Alexander wasn't very good at smiling; his facial muscles weren't really built for it.

    Fiction book (1999)

  • Postoperatively, transient facial weakness was seen in 6 patients, and a complete loss of facial muscle function was seen in 1.

    Academic text (2005)

Synonyms

zygomaticus
vsfacial muscle
  • Specialized
1 9.9

A face muscle that moves the mouth and lips when you smile

is the general category for all muscles that create facial expressions
cheek muscle
vsfacial muscle
  • Specialized
4.2

A part of the face that flattens the cheek and pulls back the corner of the mouth

is the broad class including this and other expression movers
platysma
vsfacial muscle
  • Specialized
9.9

A thin flat muscle on each side of the neck that helps move the lower jaw and mouth

is about muscles located on the face itself rather than in the neck

Surface Forms

facial muscle singular
facial muscles plural

Morphology

facial + muscle

The meaning 'any of the skeletal muscles located in the face' is directly and compositionally derived from 'facial' (connected with the face) + 'muscle' (body tissue that produces movement). This simple descriptive noun–noun combination follows common cross-linguistic patterns, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents will readily understand the MWE.

Etymology

Facial muscle: The compound noun facial muscle comes from combining facial (relating to the 'face') and muscle (the parts that move the body). Imagine the thin bands under your skin that pull your mouth, eyes and brows to make 'expressions', so it means the muscles that move the face.