Body Language of The Death Grip Handshake
Cue: Death Grip Handshake.
Synonym(s): Bone Crusher Handshake.
Description: A handshake that employs a macho bone crushing grip.
In One Sentence: The death grip handshake signifies the need for dominance.
How To Use it: Use the bone crusher to show your physical strength through aggression. The application is suited to situations when you want or need to maintain authority over another person. A boss should use a higher than average amount of force over junior managers and low ranking employees especially when he wishes to assert himself.
Context: General.
Verbal Translation: “I’m really insecure and I’m displaying this by crushing the life out of your hand in hopes you will submit to the pressure of my strength and dominance.”
Variant: See Country Handshake (The), Cold Dead Wet Fish Handshake, Double Gripper Politician Handshake or Double Hander (The), Short Grabber/Finger Grabber Handshake, Oddball Handshake, Palm Up, Palm Down and Palm Even Handshakes, Stiff Arm And Thrust Forward Handshake, Death Grip Handshake, Wrench Forward Handshake, Undershaker Handshake, Wrist Hold Handshake, Wrist Hold Handshake and Upper Arm Grip Handshake, Limp Fish Handshake, Teacup Handshake, Arm Twister Handshake (The), Firm handshake, Fist Bumping.
Cue In Action: Uncle Steve was always the guy you had to watch out for. He was a short, but stocky kind of guy, that worked out all the time and when he shook your hand – you knew he meant business. His grip was strong, firm, and often overbearing.
Meaning and/or Motivation: Those that employ a macho bone crushing grip have aggressive personalities and intend to try to dominant you from the start. However, the true origins of this handshake, usually lies in insecurity. The underlying negative feelings foster a need to prove themselves at every instant.
It says “I have the power over you and can cause you pain if I so desire.” They have no regard for how others perceive them and use pain to put people in their place.
Rings on the fingers can make matters even worse, and they know it! You can put these people in their place by verbalizing your pain, and drawing other people’s attention to it jokingly. Most people wont have enough confidence to be vocal about it, which is how the death gripper gets his power, but if done properly can make others laugh and set yourself apart.
Cue Cluster: Watch for cues of insecurity coupled with aggression such as encroaching on personal space, leaning in, elbow and finger jabs, playful punching, boisterousness, loud talking, pranks, and so forth.
Body Language Category: Arrogance or arrogant body language, Aggressive body language, Dominant body language, Low confidence body language, Low confidence hand displays, Masked body language, Negative body language, Power play, Social touching, Threat displays.
Resources:
Aström, J ; Thorell, L H ; Holmlund, U ; D’Elia, G. Handshaking, personality, and psychopathology in psychiatric patients, a reliability and correlational study. Perceptual and motor skills 1993, Vol.77(3 Pt 2): 1171-86.
Anderson, C. A., & Bushman, B. J. (2002). Human aggression. Annual Review of Psychology, 53, 27–51. http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.53.100901.135231.
Bjorkqvist, K., Osterrnan, K. and Lagerspetz, K.M.I. (1994) ‘Sex Differences in Covert Aggression among Adults’, Aggressive Behaviour 20: 27–33.
Chaplin William F.; Phillips Jeffrey B; Brown Jonathan D.; Clanton Nancy R.; Stein Jennifer L.; 2000. Handshaking, gender, personality, and first impressions Journal of personality and social psychology. 79(1): 110-117.
Dolcos, Sanda ; Sung, Keen ; Argo, Jennifer J ; Flor-Henry, Sophie ; Dolcos, Florin. The power of a handshake: neural correlates of evaluative judgments in observed social interactions. Journal of cognitive neuroscience. 2012 24(12): 2292-305.
Da Gloria, Jorge ; Duda, Danièle ; Pahlavan, Farzaneh ; Bonnet, Philippe. “Weapons effect” revisited: Motor effects of the reception of aversive stimulation and exposure to pictures of firearms. Aggressive Behavior. 1989 15(4): 265-271.
Frumin, Idan; Ofer Perl; Yaara Endevelt-Shapira; Ami Eisen; Neetai Eshel; Iris Heller; Maya Shemesh; Aharon Ravia; Lee Sela; Anat Arzi and Noam Sobel. A Social Chemosignaling Function for Human Handshaking. eLife 2015. 4:e05154
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.05154.
http://bodylanguageproject.com/articles/shake-hands-share-human-scent-curious-case-hand-sniffing-body-language/
Fisher, J; Rytting, M and Heslin, R. 1976. Hands touching hands: affective and evaluative effects on interpersonal touch, Sociometry 39: 416–421.
Freedman, Norbert ; Blass, Thomas ; Rifkin, Arthur ; Quitkin, Frederic Lanzetta, John T. (editor). Body movements and the verbal encoding of aggressive affect. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 1973. 26(1): 72-85.
Gueguen, Nicolas. Handshaking and Compliance With a Request – A Door-to-door Setting. Social Behavior and Personality. 2013. 41(10): 1585-1588.
http://bodylanguageproject.com/articles/handshakes-lead-compliance-study/
Greenbaum, Paul ; Rosenfeld, Howard. Varieties of touching in greetings: Sequential structure and sex-related differences. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior. 1980. 5(1): 13-25.
Ghareeb, P.A. ; Bourlai, T. ; Dutton, W. ; McClellan, W.T. Reducing pathogen transmission in a hospital setting. Handshake verses fist bump: a pilot study. Journal of Hospital Infection. 2013. 85(4): 321-323.
Hines, N.J. and Fry, D.P. (1994) ‘Indirect Modes of Aggression among Women of Buenos Aires, Argentina’, Sex Roles 30: 213–24.
Hiemstra, Kathleen M. Shake My Hand: Making the Right First Impression in Business With Nonverbal Communications.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included). Business Communication Quarterly. 1999. 62(4): 71.
Jeffrey D. Fisher; Marvin Rytting; Richard Heslin. 1976. Hands Touching Hands: Affective and Evaluative Effects of an Interpersonal Touch. Sociometry, 39(4): 416-421.
Lagerspetz, K.M.J., Bjorkqvist, K. and Peltonen, T. (1988) ‘Is Indirect Aggression Typical of Females? Gender Differences in Aggressiveness in 11- to 12-year-old Children’, Aggressive Behavior 14: 403–14.
Lipsitz, Rebecca (2000). “A Gripping Start.” In Scientific American (September), p. 32.
Morris, Desmond (1994). Bodytalk: The Meaning of Human Gestures (New York: Crown Publishers).
Nell, Victor. Crueltys rewards: The gratifications of perpetrators and spectators. Behavioral and Brain Sciences. 2006. 29(3): 211-224.
Ostrowsky, Michael K. Are violent people more likely to have low self-esteem or high self-esteem? Aggression and Violent Behavior. 2010. 15(1): 69-75.
Parker, G. A. (1974). Assessment strategy and the evolution of fighting behaviour. J. Theor. Biol. 47, 223-243.
Pease, Barbara and Allan Pease. 2006. The Definitive Book of Body Language Hardcover. Bantam.
Pailing, Andrea ; Boon, Julian ; Egan, Vincent. Personality, the Dark Triad and violence
Personality and Individual Differences. 2014. 67: 81-86.
Szamado, S. (2008). How threat displays work: species-specific fighting techniques, weaponry and proximity risk. Anim. Behav. 76, 1455-1463.
Stewart, Greg L. ; Dustin, Susan L. ; Barrick, Murray R. ; Darnold, Todd C. Zedeck, Sheldon (editor). Exploring the Handshake in Employment Interviews. Journal of Applied Psychology. 2008 93(5): 1139-1146.
Sanda Dolcos; Keen Sung; Jennifer J. Argo; Sophie Flor-Henry and Florin Dolcos. The Power of a Handshake: Neural Correlates of Evaluative Judgments in Observed Social Interactions. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience. 24; 12: 2292–2305.
http://bodylanguageproject.com/articles/handshake-open-body-language-powerful-nonverbal-effect-brain/
Spezialetti, Brian D. Do’s and don’ts for winning the job interview. (laboratory technicians). Medical Laboratory Observer. 1995. 27(7): 51-53.
Wesson, David A. The handshake as non-verbal communication in business. (marketing technique). Marketing Intelligence & Planning. 1992. 10(9): 61(6).