Women and the hand to mouth gesture

Factual Questions
1

Whenever women (rarely men) are shocked or frightened the hand comes up to cover the mouth. Just seen another example in the move Deepwater Horizon when the wife learns by phone that her husband Mark Wahlberg’s rig is on fire, right away up comes the hand to cover the mouth. You see this everywhere both in life and in film.

Is this learned behavior, instinctive or what? I know Japanese women cover the mouth when laughing but that seems to be unconnected, they don’t want to show their teeth. I don’t know whether they also cover the mouth when shocked. How widespread is this? Is it confined to certain countries or is it universal?

2

It’s learned behaviour with roots in etiquette, like covering your mouth when yawning or coughing.

3

This has been talked about before earlier this year though I think not with regards to women specifically. General belief was it is a cultural behavior but there was a fair amount of disagreement as to it’s origin. Some bit of discussion was on why we do this. Try looking at this:

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=782387&highlight=hand+mouth