And here it is again...

How many of these shots have we seen now from press conferences involving some sort of accusation or resignation. What exactly is this expression? How many shots do the photographers need to take and sort through before they nail it -- is it an ongoing expression, or fleeting? Is it spontaneous, or an expression assumed to attempt to mask another?

This shot of Bank of America CEO Ken Lewis announcing his resignation seems to be the classic illustration for these stories. I can only assume photo editors know what they want to convey when they pick it. Let's take it apart:

The first thing you may notice is the pulled down mouth corners and downcast eyes -- but does the rest of his face look sad? The inner corners of his eyes are drawn in and down, they aren't lifting in and up like in a typical sad expression. His lips are drawn completely inside his mouth and pressed tightly together, and like the eyebrows, that's a strong indication of anger.

Could the intense clamping of the lips and the downward/no-eye contact gaze be an indication of an intense anger that must at all costs be restrained? A stony mask to wear during one of the more painful and infuriating experiences of your life? An attempt to appear serious and appropriately concerned when in fact extremely aggravated? What do you see?

The Eyes Have It

Have you ever noticed that human eyes are rather significantly different than the eyes of other mammals, including (or maybe even especially) those of other primates? A new study from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Antropology in Germany has hypothesized that our white sclera and high-contrast irises have helped others understand where our gaze is directed, which in turn improved our social communication and cooperation abilities.

Why Eyes are So Alluring

Can you think of times when you've reacted to just a minor movement of someone's gaze?

The classic is the party scene where, even without the person moving their head, you notice their gaze leave your face and move over your shoulder to someone beyond. This is a subtle, but strong social cue that the conversation is drawing to a close and, unless you want to seem uncouth, you need to move aside in such a way to allow your conversational partner to leave.

Share other gaze-related body language cues in the comments!

Rating the Experts

Below is a five-minute local news video with the authors of a book on body language for job interviews. While most of what they say won't be news to readers of this blog, it's interesting to watch the body language on display during the interview. What sticks out for you? I share my impressions after the video:


Scroll down for impressions:





The first thing I noticed is the (reasonable) nervousness of the male author - he's appropriately using his hands but maybe he's thinking about his body language too much and so he trips over his speech a bit. The tall barstools are terrific for exposing the whole body here - compare the ramrod straight posture, big social smiles and submissive hands in laps of the guests with the upright but more relaxed and dominant bodies and faces of the hosts. Not unlike a job interview!

Note that the male guest mirrors the male host, and the women do this as well. My favorite part was the put-on look of surprise at one point from the female host - it lasts way too long and is a dead give-away that she's not actually surprised but that she wants to convey that emotion to the audience. What did you see?

Slip of the Lips?

Obama Leaks Emotion Over Gates Affair

What does a "pursed lip" mean? In this ABC News article, the author offers the evidence of several body language experts who parse this and other facial expressions for readers.

"I think Obama was disappointed in himself that he got sucked into this," said [TJ] Walker, CEO of Media Training Worldwide. "It's so rare that he does stumble into something. Compared to the last four presidents, he gets off message and sticks his foot in his mouth less often."

Later in the article, FBI profiler Brad Garrett was consulted:

"Lip tightening is usually read as "trying to control their speech or are getting angry," he said. "It makes sense that someone as cool as Obama was probably pissed that he used that one word [stupidly] and that the press made such a big deal out of it."

Crime suspects [and others] bite, gnaw, cover their mouths, put folders over their faces -- all as an "obstruction," according to Garrett."

What do you think? I know I purse and chew my lips all the time, but am not known for my verbal restraint either. Sometimes I notice it in myself and others during times of questioning or decision-making -- or could it be the urge to "keep one's mouth shut" until the answer has been reached?

Read the entire ABC News article.

Kim Jong Il

Older, ailing and increasingly frail? Yes. Still in charge? Definitely:



Other side of the same shot:



Still the boss:



Photos and story at the New York Times.

Paul Ekman grades "Lie to Me"--the show he inspired

Reading Between The Lies
By Marc D. Allan
Special to The Washington Post
Sunday, July 12, 2009

With the first season of "Lie to Me" completed, Paul Ekman is ready to assign grades to the Fox drama he inspired:

A-minus for entertainment value, B-plus for realism.

Ekman, a professor emeritus at the University of California at San Francisco and a social psychologist who works in the area of deception and demeanor, said 85 percent of what "Lie to Me" depicts is accurate.

"Baum does care to get it right," Ekman said.

He was speaking of Samuel Baum, who created the show after learning about Ekman's work using facial expressions and verbal tics to help determine whether someone is telling the truth.
"I thought a franchise set around someone who did that kind of work would give real scope to the kinds of cases you could explore -- one week a political thriller, one week a family drama," Baum said. "A little movie every week."

He centered the show on a character named Cal Lightman (played by Tim Roth), an in-your-face investigator who leads a firm that helps law enforcement and government agencies.
The Lightman Group -- partner Gillian Foster (Kelli Williams), newcomer Ria Torres (Monica Raymund) and researcher Eli Loker (Brendan Hines) -- is typically hired to investigate crimes. But occasionally its clients are people such as a multimillionaire who wants to know whether his fiancee really loves him.

Read the rest of the article at the Washington Post

What a Nod Says

Do we "thin-slice" body language to quickly gauge someone's socioeconomic status? Some preliminary research indicates what many of us know as common TV tropes -- the eager young striver, the bored, contemptuous socialite -- bears itself out with body language during stranger interactions. Not only do those with lower SES show more engagement behavior and those with higher SES less in this study, third parties were more likely (than chance) to recognize and assign SES correctly after watching these interactions.

A lay media piece can be found at Muzi.com: Body Language Reveals Wealth

They found that students whose parents were from higher socioeconomic status (SES) backgrounds engaged in more of what he called "impolite" behaviors, such as grooming, doodling and fidgeting. Lower SES students showed more "I'm interested" gestures, including laughter and raising of the eyebrows.

The full text of the original article is available at the journal Psychological Science, Jan 2009: Signs of Socioeconomic Status: A Thin-Slicing Approach

ABSTRACT—Socioeconomic status (SES) is a primary determinant of health vulnerabilities and social affiliations. To ascertain if SES is signaled in brief patterns of nonverbal behavior, we had participants of varying SES backgrounds engage in a brief interaction with a stranger. Videos of 60-s slices of these interactions were coded for nonverbal cues of disengagement and engagement, and estimates of participants' SES were provided by naive observers who viewed these videos. As predicted by analyses of resource dependence and power, upper-SES participants displayed more disengagement cues (e.g., doodling) and fewer engagement cues (e.g., head nods, laughs) than did lower-SES participants. Results were also consistent with the thin-slicing literature, in that observers' estimates of SES were reliable with each other and accurately predicted targets' family income, maternal education, and subjective SES. Finally, nonverbal displays of disengagement and engagement predicted observers' estimates of SES, which suggests that these cues are systematic signs of SES. These results have implications for understanding the effect of SES on social interactions and patterns of disengagement and engagement in other realms.

While it's worth noting that they couldn't mask from the researchers or the naive third parties other SES "tells" like accents, clothing, accessories, or word choice, the study is still intriguing. When you are people watching, look for non-mirrored nods and laughs, or doodles and self-grooming during conversation - do they tell you something about the status (socioeconomic or other) of the participants? When you meet with your supervisor, who nods more?

Analysis of Body Language - Joe Navarro

Once you start looking at this stuff, you can't stop! Where in the past a flight delay may have made you frown like the rest, now you can kick back and enjoy the smorgasboard of body language available to you in the airport, or anywhere else humans gather and you have a spare moment.

Below, Joe Navarro talks with Ann Curry about decoding body language in pictures and video:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

(Sorry for the heaping helping of US politicians - but they are a body language gold mine!)

Body Language by Joe

Much of the material Amy shared in the Body Language portion of the workshop was adapted from the terrific new book "What Every Body Is Saying" by Joe Navarro, an ex-FBI agent and body language expert.

Here he talks about signs of discomfort, especially those people show facially:

Joe Navaro: How to Read Faces

My favorite part is at the end where he discusses how people in a discussion use body language to demonstrate whether or not you are welcome to join the conversation. Most of us have probably experienced this and understood the message being conveyed, even without realizing exactly what on someone's body was telling us "hey, get lost!"

I (Jennie) really enjoyed Joe Navarro's book. They aren't all so well written or as backed up by research, so definitely recommended.