Nonverbal communication is an elaborate secret code that is written nowhere, known by none, and understood by all.
Edward Sapir
We left last week on the idea that the human ear is highly adapted to perceive phonemes (the units of sounds associated with languages) – however, not everything in communication is made of noise or auditive signals. Today, we’re going to talk about hearing what isn’t said. Today, we’re going to talk about visual communication.
One of the differences between verbal and non-verbal communications (obvious difference excluded) is the fact that nonverbal communication can happen unconsciously. We will take a closer look at various forms of nonverbal communications and investigate how they are communicative. Some people have a sharper control than others over all the things they do that can say something about them. Some people “leak” information without knowing it. Another difference is that nonverbal communication is commonly used at 3 different levels: far away; up close; and in conversation. Let’s take a closer look at each level.
Far away. As far as the eye can see, there is possible visual communication. The first form of communication happens when two people are too far to be able to talk to each other (shouting can be an option, but it is thankfully not such a common form of verbal communication). At such distance, you can gain information about someone else by looking at their general appearance or their gait.
The way someone looks is going to give you information about the attention they pay to their clothes, hair, and general style. It could give you insight into their daily lives, the type of job they have. It can even tell you how confident they are about themselves. Look at the pictures of the 3 men in suits. The ones on either side clearly have no idea how to wear a suit – there is no sense of style and the suits aren’t fitted at all. They look rather ridiculous and uncomfortable in their clothes. The one in the middle on the other hand looks like someone who is used to wearing a suit: it is fitted, classy, and very stylish. He looks sure of himself. The way those men wear a suit reflect a whole different story. And you get all that by looking at how people wear one piece of clothing. Look at the pictures of the 4 women now. All of them have a different style, they wear different types of clothes, different type of shoes. They all have a definite style, unique to each of them, that will reflect a very different message.
The second way to gain information at such distance is by looking at how someone walks. Going back to the 4 women, they’re all walking but the way they walk is probably different for each of them. Some could be swinging their hips more, some swinging their shoulders more, some not moving either while walking (rather unlikely though). By just looking at a walking figure, like those dot lights on the right, we can infer someone’s gender, estimate their age, and even have an idea about their sexuality. Crazy, right? Now imagine when you are looking at a real person walking, having access to even more information (like their appearance) – you will infer even more from their gait. Let them walk closer to us.
Up close. There. The 2 people interacting are now closer to each other, close enough to shake hands for example but not actively talking to each other just yet. At this distance, we gain access to another type of information. We can look at people’s body posture. The way we stand and the way we seat can provide information about how we feel about a situation, our level of interest or how comfortable we are. Someone who slouches and someone who sits up straight on their chair won’t send the same information.
You've probably heard about dominant and defensive postures. While the research is still debating whether or not producing a confident posture can actually make you more confident, it has been shown that the feeling of pride is very often associated with a more open/chest up sort of posture. Fear or disgust on the other hand have been associated with curling the shoulders up or recoiling. Crossing your arms doesn’t mean anything per se; it depends how your arms are crossed and what is your general body posture (i.e., leaning back, forward, shoulders up or down). When giving a lecture or a presentation, the body postures of people in the audience speak volume about their level of interest. But then, some people don’t even notice the way they place their body in space, it can be instinctive. Some people on the other hand are always very composed, caring about their every move and aware of each limb position in space. Such level of attention must be exhausting… Anyway, let’s say you just attracted someone’s attention, pulling them off their daydreaming moment, and you start talking to them
In conversation. When some starts talking, they generally do two things: they start gesturing and their faces start moving. This is the most precise level of visual information you can get about someone. They help transmitting nuances regarding what is said, it can enhance or moderate the verbal content. Gestures and facial expressions are heavily influenced by culture and shared across species. Gestural communication is actually thought to be the first form of communication to appear between individuals: before our linguistic organs develop enough to allow us to produce sounds, we would communicate using hand and arm movements very similar to the ones we can observe nowadays in great apes. How do we use them in conversation?
Discourse gestures are the gestures associated with speech; there’re all the hands movement you’re doing when talking to someone. Some research actually showed that using your hands during a speech or a conversation helps you reasoning and keeping track of what you are saying. Try it the next time you’re talking to a friend: sit on your hands and try having a conversation. You might find it harder to remember what you wanted to say. We’re so used to using our hands while talking that, as I’m writing this post, I am using my hands to emphasise my “speech” (yep, I’m pulling faces and moving my hands in front of my laptop… helps me focus though!). One of the most common discourse gestures are iconic gestures: there are illustrations of what we’re talking about. Pictograph gestures represent objects; you’re talking about a vase and start shaping it out of thin air, while describing its size, shape, and specific characteristic. Kinetograph gestures are the ones representing movements; you’re talking about your weekend and you’re describing your run to friends while moving your arms as if you were running. Finally, spatiograph gestures are the ones relatives to spatial organisation; you’re describing the position of objects in space, some being in front of others, to the left, or behind something.
Last but not least, when talking to people (or writing a blog post), we tend to use our faces a lot. It is the main modulating and communicative tool we have after the ability to speak. What’s so special about the face? Glad you asked. Our face is usually the first body part someone else sees or focuses on when interacting with us. With one look at a person’s face we can gain information about their gender, ethnicity, age, and even general health. The face also has an active communicative function: it is the most muscular part of our body with about 50 muscles. That allows us to produce a wide range of movements and an almost infinite possible range of gross to fine combinations of expressions. They are culturally-influenced: we don’t all pull out the same faces in a given situation and we are better at understanding the expressions of our relatives, friends, or people from the same country as us. It’s called an “in-group advantage”. You can change in-group through life: by moving to a different country, you’ll be exposed to new facial expressions and you'll learn not only to understand them but also to reproduce them appropriately in conversation.
If nonverbal communication can accidentally “leak” information about us or our emotional states, it is possible to control the message send or change people’s take on us. Moreover, all those different signals (look, gait, postures, gestures, and expressions) tap into first impressions and what people perceive about our personality… But that’s a story for another day.
TATA for now!
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