Tag Archive for People

A Caution About Biases During The Baselining Process

by  • March 5, 2013 • 0 Comments

Self hugging can mean that he's shy or just a place to put his hands.

Self hugging can mean that he’s shy or just a place to put his hands.

We also have inherent biases which we must be careful of when try to read other people. Our dislike of certain people could influence us to read their language in a less then favourable light. Knowing that this bias is an inherent possibility, can at least protect us in terms of accuracy, and set up conditions that avoid possibly destructive fallout. This is only one factor to be careful of while reading people as it relates to baselining. Reading lying body language, by example, is very difficult and not having anything to compare it to essentially makes it impossible.

Poker is an excellent game that hones our nonverbal analysis of people, and the best modern day poker players will, with the advent and popularity of televised poker, review thousands of hours of video on their opponents. While some of the time they are watching to pick up on specific “tells” they are also developing their baseline. By doing so, even prior to meeting them they can have some players pegged. They can then use their baseline to determine actions, especially novel ones, that are out of the ordinary. If you’ve ever walked into a new poker group, you understand exactly what I mean. You might know some of the people, but usually there are others that you haven’t yet met add to this a novel context and you’ve got your work cut out for you. Since you don’t know the other player’s baselines you naturally end up being cautious and if you know poker cautious being “tight” can be just as bad as being “loose”. Over time you build their character and they start to “make sense”. In everyday life we call this process “getting to know someone” but in the body language world, we are formulating their baseline. Baselining is really about having the ability to compare someone to themselves.

Nose crinkle can mean a negative thought as in a game of poker. I've, however, see this gesture feigned (and yes I lost the hand over this bluff).

The ‘nose crinkle’ can mean a negative thought as in getting a bad card in a game of poker. I’ve, however, seen this gesture feigned (and yes I lost the hand over this well executed bluff).

Let’s look at arm crossing or even touching the nose. Everyone thinks that arm crossing means that someone is closed and unreceptive. This might be true for some people some of the time, but to others, it means that they are comfortable. If I were to cross my arms, just now, would it mean I was closed? No, it wouldn’t, it simply means that my arms are crossed. The same goes for nose touching as an indication of lying or deception. Some people touch their nose at the end of every sentence – it’s their idiosyncrasy. Does this mean that every word that comes from their mouth is a lie? It could be, but it is not likely. Once we’ve caught someone in a lie we can backtrack and look at the clues that preceded the lie and those that followed the lie to pick up on cues that might have given him away. Poker players do just this, although for them it’s simpler since there really are only two possible scenarios, he is bluffing, or he really has a strong hand. Video even provides professional poker players with one hundred percent of the information at hand, there are no secrets and so baselining can happen very quickly. In real life, things are not as obvious and there is a lot of gray in between the truth and a lie so it takes a lot more effort do develop baselines, however with practice even novel situations with unknown people will begin to appear similar to other past experiences and people. So baselining provides us with information that we can use in the future when lying or any other emotional behaviour is suspected, where we can draw from our database of “tells” and make educated guesses about the truthfulness, or emotional state of our subject or subjects.

Baselining

by  • March 5, 2013 • 0 Comments

Does he always sit on his hands or is he hiding something?

Does he always sit on his hands or is he hiding something?

Baselining is probably one of the most important and often overlooked aspects of reading body language. It refers to the “normal” motions that populate the repertoire of each and every person on the planet. Normal here is the operative word. We can’t even begin to read someone until we first have their baseline pegged. For example, to read someone that is normally flighty and constantly moving, as agitated is wrong since they are merely acting out their particular “idiosyncratic nonverbal behaviour.” That is, the body language that is particular to specific people and that makes up their repertoire, or basket of cues considered normal for them. This person might be flighty or high strung by nature but they certainly can’t be constantly agitated by nature as our nervous systems can’t tolerate perpetual stress. A person high strung by nature who seemingly freezes instantly is telling us based on their baseline that something is up. Baselining tells us that a condition in their environment has changed and it has affected them. It now becomes our job to detect the cause for the change.

Baselining involves learning about how a person usually sits, how they use their hands to gesture, where they place their hands while at rest and relaxed or when nervous, how they place their feet when standing, their overall posture, how they prefer to cross their legs such as whether they cross them equally left over right as right over left, and so on. The list to baselining is utterly endless as are the myriad of cues that can be emitted from the human body, fraught with or, absent of, meaning.

By establishing a baseline it will be possible to catch sudden changes in body language. This is the ultimate purpose to establishing a person’s baseline. Without catching the changes, body language loses its ability to indicate exactly what is going on. For example, a younger brother that is acting exuberant and ecstatic who is jumping around with joy and happiness, who, at a moments notice, finds himself in the presence of an older brother only to suddenly cease his joyful movements, turtles his head into his shoulders, and becomes quiet, says a lot about what kind of relationship they have been having lately. Body language is directly linked to emotions, and so when it changes, we know that something has cause the change, and more often than not, it will be precisely the event that preceded it.

These changes aren’t just limited to events either, they can also be tied to words spoken, or even topics. A married couple might be carrying on amicably, but when there is mention of an ex-girlfriend, even casually, the wife might begin to display dominant and closed body language such as crossing arms, wagging fingers, or scolding eyes. She is indicating that this women or topic is a particular sore spot between them and the sudden change in mood, from good to bad, tells us that it is the topic that is the issue. Criminal investigators will frequently steer suspects off-topic (and seemingly off the record) by talking about favourite pass-times or hobbies by example. This serves the investigator by producing relaxed body language. Once a baseline is established interrogators begin to introduce facts surrounding the investigation to measure their effects. They might begin with items not even connected to the trial and then suddenly introduce a murder weapon, for example, to see if nervous body language appears. During criminal investigations the murder weapon can be kept a secret from the public especially early on, so only the real criminal would exhibit a visceral response to viewing it. While these sorts of interrogations won’t directly lead to a conviction, it does provide clues for further exploration. Like all body language, clues tell us if we are on the right track or if we’ve eliminated leads, at least for the time being.

Those who don’t know about baselining will find it difficult to read other people who lack similar affect to themselves since their only reference of normal is what they do or what the average person they associate with do (which more often then not is very similar to themselves anyway since we tend to hang out with those of like mind). People that don’t baseline won’t see people for their individual characteristics, idiosyncrasies, culture and habits. As we work through life we should have our family, friends, coworkers, bosses, instructors, or anyone else we interact with regularly pegged for their baseline. This will not only make reading them easier, it will also give us “archetypes” that can be cross referenced as comparisons. This in turn, gives us a better chance at evaluating others, even strangers, on the spot, and in real time.

The Five Cardinal Rules Of Body Language

by  • March 5, 2013 • 3 Comments

Is she cold, or angry?

Is she cold, or angry?

Single gestures by themselves can not reveal the true meaning of the situation. There are many more factors that play into reading people then just identifying single cues. When people move, they are fluid and changing, so too are their moods and context. One must use the full picture to discover the story. The ‘rule of four’, congruency, context, baselining, and intuition are the five cardinal rules that any body language master must abide by and we cover them next.

Using Body Language To Get The Results You Want!

by  • March 5, 2013 • 3 Comments

A confident posture includes having the shoulders back and upright, head up and level and a well balances body. Confident people move freely without hesitation, make appropriate gestures, and hold smiles often. People that lack confidence will walk with a hunched back, they will be careless with their arm gestures, will sulk and frown, and their head will droop. They often appear sad or tired and the frown lines in their face will depend with time producing permanent wrinkles. Often they aren’t much fun to be around and seem to be taking every chance to drag you others around them down. However, far from acting consciously, people who lack confidence are acting out of habit and routine.

Subconscious facial expressions can make people think you don't like them which might be opposite to what you intend. In this case, we see scorn when perhaps what was intended was deep thought.

Subconscious facial expressions can make people think you don’t like them which might be opposite to what you intend. In this case, we see ‘scorn.’

Part of the power behind body language stems from its direct connection to someone’s overall disposition, how life has treated them, and also how they treat life in return. Since all people face challenges confident body language tells others if a person actively takes control of their life or lets life push them around.

If you meet a “Not OK” person you will subconsciously feel uneasy or suspicious. Sometimes people put on a good temporary show but within a few minutes their bodies relax only to revert back to their natural dispositions. We instinctively know this and read it, but don’t always bring it to our active consciousness to process it. Have you ever asked others what your body language portrays? Do you hold certain gestures that make you look unapproachable or negative?

One of my wife’s friends consistently receives negative comments about her scowls despite being an extremely kind hearted person. However her natural face appears ‘bitchy’, so much so that it’s her defining feature and one that is joked about by those that really know her. This example raises an important point. Our bodies leak information without our consent and when we aren’t receiving the results we want, we should do something proactive about it. From an outside perspective, people think that her face really shows inner turmoil and then discount her kindheartedness even on a first impression. It is her facial expressions that set the tone with others, even before she has the chance to speak. She then must work extra diligently to reverse the first impression she creates. People naturally perceive those that hold negative facial expressions and body language to be holding a grudge. This story outlines the importance of monitoring our gestures and facial expressions to convey the types of feelings we wish to show the world and achieve the results we desire. Thus, while I don’t know this person well enough to explain this trait to her without offending her, others have, but with only mediocre results. At least now she is aware of what impression she makes, so she can resolve matters more quickly if she senses negativity from others. With just a modest change she could reap immense results.

The point here is that if you hold negative body language, it’s not yet too late to fix things so hold your head up high and watch people around you begin to treat you better. Sit more upright, swing your arms, smile more and despite inner feelings, start acting happy. Body language is a great way to ‘fake it until you make it’. Holding confident body language makes us feel confident so let’s use our bodies to change the patterns in our brains.

OK vs. Not Ok Personality Traits

by  • March 5, 2013 • 6 Comments

Dr. Eric Berne, the founder of the psychological school of Transactional Analysis (abbreviated TA) coined the terms “OK” and “Not OK” to describe two essential types of people. The “OK” types are secure and confident in who they are and carry little emotional “baggage” whereas the “Not OK” types are insecure about themselves and often feel inferior. Dr. Berne also helped to define certain terms that were important in studying social interaction. When two people meet eventually one of the persons will acknowledge the presence of the other person. He called this the “transactional stimulus” where a “transaction” refers to a conversation between people. When people interact to each other, they talk or express nonverbal body communication, they issue a “transactional response”. Those that are (obsessively) interested in social dynamics often begin to think of interactions down to the unit. These definitions, however, are merely presented for interest sake, since for our purpose they aren’t terribly important.

Berne’s approach was much different from that of Freud who though perhaps too simplistically, that he could learn everything about someone just by asking them, and then listening to their response. Berne felt that therapists could learn more about people by watching their body language and facial expressions instead of words by themselves.

Eric Berne published a very popular and interesting book called Games People Play in 1964. To date it has sold over five million copies. The book describes the function and dysfunction that happens in human interactions. Without getting into too much detail, let’s look at one example of a game.

The example I wanted to bring forward makes light of how we control our interactions with people by the tone and words we choose. As a boss, if we attack an employee by taking up a controlling “parental” role we will normally elicit a childish tantrum in return. The real way to deal with adult situations is to attack them from a constructive integrity based position where we act like “adults”. Adult actions normally yield adult responses, but as we see in Berne’s book, not everyone uses the best framework to work through life. As he sees it, some people get stuck between three ego states, the “Parent”, “Child” and “Adult”. Berne outlines well over ninety games that people play, some good, but mostly bad. He defines games as social interactions that are counterproductive. Today, there are few ardent followers that use the TA approach in any rigid way, even the ego states have been scrutinized, however, the principles of the method do help us look at how we run our lives and the ways we hold ourselves back through games we play with ourselves and others. He also ran a results-based framework which was new to psychiatry at the time and says that if it’s not working for you and you aren’t getting the results you want, change it!

The Benefits Of Subconscious Mirroring

by  • March 5, 2013 • 0 Comments

If you haven't yawned yet, you've at least had to suppress it!

If you haven’t yawned yet, you’re active mind is working hard to suppress it!

The more attention we give to an action during observation, the more likely we are to copy the behaviour. Take traveling abroad, for example, where a constant exposure to accents eventually sees us adopting it presumably to fit in better. It’s been shown too, that the more we imitate other people, the more we tend to like them and presumably the more they like us. It works in reverse as well since the more we like them the more we imitate them. Mirroring and imitation therefore is a salient characteristic in our nonverbal communication and shows others that we like and are connecting with them.

In 2000 Swedish researcher Dr. Ulf Dimberg exposed volunteers to frowning, smiling and expressionless faces. They were then told to react to them in various ways. When they saw a smiling face, they were sometimes asked to smile back and other times to frown back. The researchers found that it was difficult for the subjects to remain expressionless to a face that appeared happy or angry and even more difficult to smile at sad faces or make sad faces at laughing faces. The theory was advanced that our unconscious minds exerts much more control over our faces then we think. While it was somewhat possible to control the subject’s reactions, it required a great deal of mental power to reverse their natural tendencies. The study showed that even when we could control our emotions, minute spontaneous twitches still revealed true responses, and in every case, mirroring was the natural tendency.

The research on the reasoning behind the mirror reflex remains obscure for the moment, but this doesn’t mean we should ignore it. In fact, we should be very careful about our facial expressions and gestures since they will necessarily have a profound effect on others. Our expressions and body gestures illicit similar responses from others, so if we want to make people happy, we should smile more and use more expressive body language. In turn, others around us will naturally mimic our gestures.