We might not have noticed that human’s bodies are constantly telling the story all the time. From facial expression, body posture, and tone of voice has an ability to reveal individual’s secret through carefully observing. In a book “Every body is saying,” the author, Joe Navarro, former FBI’s Agent, has an interest in studying the most internationally language-nonverbal behavior -in the world which has helped him perceive individual’s thought and detect people feelings. The book has a variety of vivid language, foreign vocabularies, and clear figures along the story which is useful for ordinary people and ESL students. From the context, Joe Navarro categorizes how people transmit their thought through their nonverbal behavior into three categories, facial expressions, body movements, and limb gestures.
When it comes to emotions, the author compares human faces to advertisement billboards. They can be easy to be observed and recognize whether they are sad, happy, or frustrated. Every part of facial muscles simultaneously collaborates to each other to express human emotion. Eyes, eyebrows, lip reflect the hidden truth because in some level human loses control over them. Even smiles can be considered as either genuine or just a social smile. Although facial expressions can reflect individual comfort or discomfort, it might be difficult to interpret because of its complexity. The author advises readers to compare to the nonverbal behaviors of the rest of the body.
The author also compares human body as a house of vital organs such as heart, lung, liver, and digestive system, during stressful conditions, limbic system demand the rest of body to protect them when confronting dangers. That said, the reflection of such a behavior can be translated individual’s thought and what is going on in the brain. People demonstrate comfort by leaning forward or move close to whomever they pleased. Conversely, they cross the arms or turn the body slightly away to indicate discomfort. Moreover, shoulders level can be used as a barometer for individual emotion. When people are in a negative emotion, their shoulder either sink or slowly rise toward ears. The author advises readers to compare the body posture with others aspect to decipher true valuable information.
Arm gestures can be significantly observed for true feeling because they are related to human attitudes and sentiments. The author says that since our ancestors were able to walk upright let arms be able to move independently. Furthermore, human arms play an important role in human survival instinct such as protecting vital organs from moving objects or threatening. For example, when people feel happy, they move their arms defy gravity freely and joyfully. On the other hand, restricting or withdrawal of arms indicated unsafe experiences. Moreover, arm postures can indicate individual confident. For example, arms akimbo assert dominance and authority, hidden hands reflect uncomfortable conversations, hands steeping signifies highly confident. Those are the important clues that the author emphasizes and recommend us to carefully observe to determine individual’s emotional states.
To conclude, the book contains many examples of nonverbal behaviors which always give us the clues through facial cues, body movements, and limb gestures. However, there is one type of human behavior that the author says it is difficult to asses, and that is a deception, Even well-trained FBI can make a mistake to detect such a behavior. Keep in mind there are no one silver-bullet for detecting the real truth. Always use all signals of possibility to identify and understanding nonverbal behavior in the meaningful aspect.
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