Social Engineering Blogs

An Aggregator for Blogs About Social Engineering and Related Fields

The Nonverbal Sleuth

Most detective procedures center around hard physical facts and evidence, but what is the role of detecting nonverbal behavior?

A new study in the Journal of Nonverbal Behavior sought to challenge conventional wisdom that emphasized physical facts over nonverbal behavior. By replicating a previous study with slightly different variants, Dr. Eric Novotny and his team sought to fold in the role of nonverbal behavior detection in developing suspicions and driving along initial investigations into criminal wrongdoing.

The paper points out that much previous research actually casts doubt on the use of nonverbal detection in investigations. While there is a great deal of research finding that nonverbal detection can be effective, such research casts doubt on the claim that this is actually relied on by police investigators or even laypeople.

However, they contend that a distinction must be made between “discovering” and “suspecting” a lie. When we discover a lie, we have finished an investigation and concluded that a lie has taken place, but what causes us to initially suspect a lie?

The central contention is that suspicion does not depend on hard evidence because it is inherently the act of intuiting or suspecting that hard evidence would exist. Thus, suspicion has a critical role in leading to the investigation in the first place.

This is where behavioral cues and nonverbal detection come into the picture. It is in noting deviations from a behavioral baseline that individuals often come to conclude that something is being hidden or that deception is taking place.

In replicating previous work that emphasized the role of hard evidence, the current study asked not just what factors led participants to “discover” a lie but, in the treatment group participants were instead asked what led them to “suspect” a lie.

Each participant was asked to recall a previous time where they had caught somebody in a lie and to explain exactly what factors led to that conclusion. They did in fact find that most participants relied on hard evidence in order to discover lies, but the story for suspicion was very different.

Over forty percent of respondents pointed to nonverbal behavior as the stimulus for them beginning to suspect a lie, with only nineteen percent pointing to physical evidence.

This presented compelling evidence for the role of nonverbal behavior in beginning to suspect deception. To further drive home these points, the paper continued by conducting an additional study, this time asking more explicitly whether lies were discovered/suspected via hard evidence/behavioral evidence, dividing participants into a total of groups.

Again, their results confirmed the main hypothesis. People cited behavioral evidence much more often for determining suspicion, while they prefer non-behavioral evidence for discovering the truth.

This research helps contribute to the very important role of non-verbal assessments in deception detection. As has often been discussed, this is hard to do, so if you want to act on these conclusions, come check out Humintell’s own training programs on deception detection.

Do Power Postures Work?

It is pretty popular for people to explore the idea of taking power postures to achieve success in interpersonal interactions, especially negotiations, but is it empirically valid?

A recent study by Drs. Joseph Cesario and David Johnson wades into this debate with a resounding rejection of the idea of power postures’ efficacy. In a series of experimental studies, they test whether taking a power posture in realistic situations accomplishes anything. Their null results fly in the face of some established precedent.

Humintell has previously blogged on power postures, including on research finding that taking on such postures can make people feel more powerful. It is logical to assume that such a feeling will manifest in more confident behavior, but it is likely this implication that Drs. Cesario and Johnson would dispute. In fact, they situate their research as a response to the same work by Cuddy which we blogged on!

Despite the popularity of TED talks devoted to power posturing, the current study delves into the evolutionary arguments in favor of power posturing. They conclude that it would make little evolutionary sense for an animal to act differently just because it is presenting the illusion of expansiveness or power.

In order to assess these claims, they conducted a series of experiments. The first of these asked participants to watch a TED talk video on power poses and attempt to consciously hold power poses.  These were contrasted with two studies where participants were not told why they should hold such a pose, and two of these studies were conducted with multiple participants in the same room.

Each participant was then brought together to compete in various tasks involving gambling, abstract thinking, and negotiation. These were intended to see if using the power pose would actually enhance abilities or competence in any of these tasks. Perhaps unsurprisingly, they found that the participants who had been exposed to the TED talk did reliably utilize the power posture in these exercises.

Overall, there did not seem to be any evidence that power poses had beneficial effects. This should cast doubt on a lot of the established literature. The study authors note that their sample sizes were generally larger and that there were consistent problems in replicated past findings.

They even asked participants to record whether their power pose led them to feel greater senses of power, and this again failed to predict much success in terms of outcomes.

This is an exciting and emerging field of research, so it is pretty natural that there would be disparate results and contradictory findings. We are definitely hoping that future researchers continue to delve into this question!

In the meantime, there are some pretty tried and true tactics for better negotiating and reading people. Check out some of our training tools here!

Nonverbal Behavior in Relationships

holding-hands-coupleWe keep talking about nonverbal behavior with strangers, but what role does it have in close interpersonal contexts?

There is plenty of reason to think that this is important! We pick up on our romantic partner’s nonverbal behavior, even if we don’t realize that we are doing it. In a recent paper, a team of psychologists led by Dr. Ruddy Faure sought to understand whether implicit partner evaluations led to significantly different nonverbal behavior, and what that means for relationships.

This research appears motivated by questions of what exactly makes some relationships last and others fall apart. Some time ago, we blogged on Dr. John Gottman’s answer to this question. He argued that the slow growth of contempt between partners will almost invariably drive them apart over time.

Dr. Faure’s answer is not quite different, focusing on the idea of implicit partner evaluations. These basically entail our often automatic feelings towards a partner, where we begin to think badly or critically. This is a shift from previous attempts to study relationship dissolution, because most past research has focused primarily on explicit emotions.

However, this research grappled with the impressive question of how to really measure those things? How can you track the implicit evaluations and nonverbal behaviors present in relationships?

To address these concerns, the team organized an intensive project where couples were videotaped discussing contentious topics. They were then asked to complete a personal diary over 8 days. Before engaging in the taped interview, each partner was asked to assess implicit partner evaluations based on subtle questionnaires.

Importantly, the taped interviews allowed for a better understanding of what nonverbal behaviors were being displayed, especially given the implicit questionnaires completed beforehand.

Overall, they found that more positive implicit evaluations did lead to more constructive nonverbal behavior. This means that the less a partner had negative associations with their partner, the kinder they expressed their emotions during the videotaped interview.

The connections to Gottman are then pretty clear. Contempt would lead to much lower implicit evaluations, emphasizing our partners’ flaws, for instance. This would inevitably come out, even if unintentionally, when trying to discuss something contentious, in the form of negative body language.

While this sort of thin may not even be consciously noticed, it certainly has the potential to impact our interactions.

If you are curious about learning more about these subtle emotional cues in relationships, check out some of our past blogs on Dr. Gottman here and here.