**Abstract** Social emotions are key to everyday social life and therefore shaped by cultural values in their expression. Prior research has focused on facial expressions of emotions. What is less clear, however, is the extent to which cultural values shape other modalities of emotional expression. In the present study, we applied a novel paradigm using depth sensor imaging technology to capture changes in participants’ body posture in real time. We aimed to (1) identify the nuances in the postural expression that are thought to characterize social emotions and (2) assess how individual differences in cultural values impact the postural expression of emotions. Participants in two separate studies were 132 undergraduate college students whose upper-body postural expansion was recorded after they recalled emotion episodes. Positive emotions elevated participants’ upper-body posture whereas negative emotions resulted in lowered upper-body posture. Cultural variables had a posture-elevating effect on participants’ upper-body posture for pride. The impact of cultural values on negative emotions was more bidirectional: Horizontal collectivistic and vertical individualistic values had an elevating effect on posture whereas horizontal individualistic and vertical collectivistic values had a negative effect. The findings provide initial evidence of the nuances in the way cultural values influence the postural expression of emotions. *(manuscript currently under review)*