Small talk

Vague, inconsequential chats about another person's general (though not specific) health, the weather, the fortunes of the local football, rugby or cricket team and similar matters may seem to some people to be hardly worth spending time on. Yet they can have an importance quite out of proportion to their apparent significance.

During small talk, when the verbal content is - to say the least - undemanding, we can give most of our concentration to other people's body language- and we do. We can even, if we wish, systematically turn our attention to each aspect of body language

1 52 so that we can learn more about the other person in less time than it would take to do so purely intuitively. Another advantage of a systematic approach is that it enables us to check that we have not missed an aspect out.

Next time you meet someone for a casual chat about nothing in particular or the next time you meet a stranger at a party, try the following approach. Take each aspect of body language discussed in this book in sequence and consider how the other is using it. First, eye contact: do they use much or little? Do they appear to want more or less eye contact? How dilated are their pupils? Are they left breakers or right breakers? Do they keep looking around at other people, or is their full attention given to you? Secondly, consider facial expressions. Are they positive or negative? Smiles and interest or scowls and disgust? Are there few or many changes in expression? Are there any micromomentary facial expressions you can spot?

What about head movements? Do they show interest with head cocks? Do they encourage you to speak with head nods? Do they respond to your head nods? Does the rhythm of their head movements fit the rhythm of their speech?

Next, are their gestures few or many? Are they expressive? Are they appropriate? Are they open or closed? Do they fold their arms in front of themselves or set up other barriers? If they cross their legs, which way do they cross them, towards you or away from you?

Look at the posture - is it upright or stooping? Do they use backward or forward lean?

Consider proximity and orientation. Do they approach closely or not? If you move closer, do they back away or turn to a less direct orientation? What do you do if they move closer? Is their orientation direct or indirect? Is it symmetrical or asymmetrical? Horizontal or vertical?

Now consider their use of bodily contact. Do they use any? In greetings only? Are they touchers or non-touchers? Which parts of the body do they touch most frequently as they are talking? Arms, hands, shoulders, backs or elsewhere? Does_the touching, where it occurs, signal greater intimacy between you or only the other's wish for greater intimacy?

Next, assess their appearance and physique and how you feel it affects your response. Do you find them attractive? Are they taller than you or shorter? Does this have any effect? Are they fat or thin? Does this affect your response to them?

What about their timing and synchronization? Does the discussion you are having dovetail neatly or do you find yourselves both speaking at the same time? If so, why? Nervousness or a failure to synchronize for some other reason?

Finally, listen to the non-verbal aspects of their speech. Do they make many speech errors? How fast do they speak? Do they speak loudly or softly? Have they a harsh tone or a smooth tone? How do the non-verbal aspects of their speech affect your response to them?

There are, of course, many other questions that can be posed, but these should provide you with a simple, yet systematic method of evaluating how other people use body language in everyday encounters. You should then be able to improve your use of body language without becoming too self-conscious and deliberate. Practice will, in any case, make things progressively easier and more natural.

Exercises and experiments

1 Who said that?

Obtain photographs of several people, taken in what for them is a normal environment. Then get them to tape record a couple of minutes' speech about a topic which will not give the environment away. See if other people can match the voices to the photographs. How successful are they?

2 How many people do you meet a day?

Make a list of all the people you meet in a day. Be careful not to miss anyone out. Then classify them into friends, family, acquaintances, strangers and non-persons (people like waiters, bus drivers, canteen staff, and so on with whom the interaction is purely functionaQ. What is the pattern of your daily interactions? Are you spending as much time with friends and family as you would like? If not, is there anything you can do about it?

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3

When you meet strangers, what is the first thing about them that you notice? Does it differ for males and females? For older people and for younger people? What are the physical characteristics you look for (or respond to) in an attractive stranger of the opposite sex?

4 Tell the truth

Either watch a television programme in which people claim to be telling the truth, and see how accurately you can identify the truth tellers - or get a group together to play the game. What deception cues help you to eliminate those least likely to be truthful? Ask those who seem to be able to pick out the right person more often than other people if they know how they do it. You will probably find that many of them put it down to a hunch and are totally unaware of how they have been influenced by body language.

In this chapter you wili leam:

• the part played by body

language in establishing and maintaining relationships with the opposite sex

• how nonverbal behaviour can be used to make an individual appear more attractive with better self-presentation and impression management.

1 56 True though it may b e that beauty i s in the eye of the beholder, it is still possible to influence what the eye sees in the first place. Knowledge is always power and knowing more, as we now do, about what people find attractive enables us to take steps to present them with what they wish to see - or at least come closer to it than we might if we were in ignorance.

But why should we bother? One reason is that those who are perceived by others as being attractive are credited with having other attributes. Several studies have shown that they are more likely to be regarded as being talented, warm and responsive, kind, sensitive, interesting, poised, sociable and outgoing. When compared with unattractive people, they are seen as having a socially desirable personality, as having higher occupational status, as being more maritally competent, as more intelligent and as being happier. Whether all attractive people possess these qualities or not is clearly open to doubt. But if they are perceived as having them, this will tend to encourage their development anyway. Truth is not always reality, but what people perceive as reality. In other words, if they think it is true, then, for all practical purposes, it is true. As we said at the beginning, beauty is indeed in the eye of the beholder.

So what is it that we are looking for? Who and what do we find attractive? Most of the studies carried out seem to suggest that men look for those characteristics in women which differentiate them from men: fuller lips, narrower eyebrows, a softer complexion, absence of facial hair, large firm breasts, a narrower waist, relatively broad hips and long legs are all usually regarded as attractive. Glenn Wilson and David Nias describe a study which revealed that, over the years, Miss World has on average been an English-speaking model, aged 2 1 , Sft Bins tall, blonde with brown eyes and with vital statistics of 35-24-35. Clearly, many women who do not match these stereotypes are regarded by men as attractive - nevertheless, studies which ask people to rate photographs of attractive women find that most respondents will agree on who they find the most attractive. But averages always do, after all, conceal a range of individual variations.

It is not quite as easy to identify what it is that women find attractive in men. Men imagine that they look for tallness, a muscular chest and shoulders, muscular biceps and a large penis. At least one study found, however, that women were more interested in a man's eyes, whether or not he was slim and

whether he had small and sexy buttocks. A number of studies have found that women are much more interested in a man's personality, dependability and general character.

Mark Cook and Robert McHenry quote a study which suggested that the ideal face for both sexes is oval in shape with a clear complexion, large blue eyes, a straight nose, a medium-sized mouth, ears which do not protrude, long eyelashes, bushy eyebrows for men and fine eyebrows for women. No face, however, is perfectly symmetrical, so some variation from the ideal is inevitable.

In reality, personal attraction does not depend simply on appearance and physique. Every aspect of body language has a contribution to make and we often overlook a less-than-perfect face or figure when, say, pupil dilation is high with plenty of eye contact, facial expressions and gestures are expressive, or we like the sound of someone's voice.

Exercise: 1 0 out of 1 0

Some readers will remember the film 1 0, starring 8 0 Derek and Dudley Moore, based in part on the idea of scoring the attractiveness of people on a scale running from one to 1 0. The film was based on a long-standing habit of young Western males when looking for the company of young, attractive females. This exercise seeks to apply the same approach to persons of either sex.

Using the rating scale in Figure 1 4. 1 (make as many copies of it as you need), rate several strangers over the next week. If you can, enlist the participation of others so that you finish up with a reasonably large number of completed scales.

Exercise review

Two things should emerge from this exercise. You should obtain a clearer idea of precisely which non-verbal behaviours and physical characteristics appeal to you in other people. You should also find that your ratings tend to agree with those of others who took part in the experiment (if you were fortunate enough to find some friends or colleagues who would).

Which is more important, appearance or some other aspect of body language? 1 57

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1 58 Score people 1 to l O on each of the following aspects of appearance and other uses of body language. Place a X in the appropriate box. 1 2 3 4 Hair Forehead Shape of head Face Eyes Nose Mouth Ears Neck Skin Body build Shoulders Chestlbreasts Arms Hands Waist Buttocks

Abdomen and pelvis Thighs Knees Calves Feet Shape of legs Length of legs Eye contact Facial expression Head movements Gestures

Posture and stance Proximity and orientation Bodily contact

Timing and synchronization Non-verbal aspects of speech TOTALS:

(For a 0 rating simply leave blank) Max = 330 figure 14.1 personal attraction assessment scale