I don't know if I can ever cross my arms across my chest again, even though it is a comfortable position, or unless I'm suspicious because apparently it is a mannerism perceived as suspicious, according to Dorothy Leeds. In an article entitled "Positive Body Language: Increase Your Sales Without Saying a Word", she suggests eight steps to better body language, including be prepared, watch your posture, make an entrance, make eye contact, dress to suit the occasion, control your hands, smile, and don't hide behind your glasses.
Leeds also says openness and cooperation can be demonstrated with open hands, by an unbuttoned coat and tilted head as well as by sitting on a chair's edge. (What if sitting on a chair's edge indicates to someone that you are ready to bolt at the slightest chance?)
Leeds noted that Albert Mehrabian "has said we are perceived three ways: 55% visually, 38% vocally and 7% verbally." Not good news for a writer-type like me who is much better with the words (especially if they are written instead of spoken) than with the hale and hearty handshake and impressive visual presentation. Although, I could never sell anything to anyone, in person or on the phone, I'm glad to present the facts and then let the person receiving those facts make up his or her mind. Actually, that's what I usually want from any salesperson. Just the facts, no spin. I have bought a vacuum cleaner in spite of the salesperson because of the facts. The hard sell drove me out the door, but I came back and bought it anyway. That salesperson obviously wasn't observing my body language as I backed away toward the door to escape.
Another time, several car salesmen lost sales when they talked only to my husband. I don't remember if I was smiling then or not. It is possible I was smiling since I usually don't want to hurt anyone's feelings. In that case, the smile is unreliable.
In a recent article called "More Than the Best Medicine" in the August 2000 issue of Scientific American, writer Meredith F. Small, a professor at Cornell University, reports on research on laughter by Vanderbilt University colleagues Jo-Anne Bachorowski and Moria Smoski as well as Cornell's Michael J. Owren. They want to know why we laugh.
She writes that Owren and Bachorowski "speculate that human laughter evolved as a unique way to make and break alliances."
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