Body Language Quick & Easy by Richard Webster

Author:Richard Webster
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: face reading, body language, posture, richard webster
Publisher: Llewellyn Worldwide, LTD.
Published: 2014-01-28T16:00:00+00:00

[contents]

The more elaborate our means of communication,

the less we communicate.

—JOSEPH PRIESTLEY

chapter six

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

Speed-dating has become a worldwide phenomenon. Eligible singles meet in groups and spend about three minutes talking one-on-one with each other. At the end of the evening, everyone marks a card saying which people they’d like to see again. The concept of speed-dating is based on the belief that you can learn enough about a person to evaluate his or her compatibility in just a few minutes.

There’s an old adage that says, “You never get a second chance to make a good first impression.” People start making their minds up about you the second they see you. By the time two minutes have passed, they have made a permanent assessment. Some people might take as long as four minutes, but this is still a very short period of time in which to make a potentially lifelong judgment. This two- to four-minute threshold applies in every type of situation, ranging from someone meeting a person of the opposite sex at a party, to a salesperson calling on a new client. By the time four minutes is up, you’ll know how easy the other person will be to deal with, whether you like him or her, and if you want to continue getting to know the person better.

In the 1980s, Dr. Michael R. Solomon, a social psychologist and marketing expert, conducted research at the Graduate School of Business at New York University. His findings suggest people make eleven decisions about someone they’ve just met in the first seven seconds. These decisions are:

1. Economic level

2. Educational level and intelligence

3. Honesty and credibility

4. Trustworthiness

5. Level of sophistication

6. Gender, sexual orientation

7. Level of success

8. Political background

9. Values and principles

10. Ethnic background

11. Social desirability—would you like this person to be a friend?

After the vital first seven seconds, they spend the rest of the time they’re together trying to confirm the accuracy of their assessment.1

Twenty years later, Janine Willis and Alexander Todorov at Prince-ton University conducted several experiments that show that we determine people’s attractiveness, likability, honesty, competence, and aggressiveness after looking at their faces for a mere tenth of a second. The researchers also found that there was no significant difference between those instant decisions and those formed after looking at the person’s face for a longer period of time.2

The first four minutes are vitally important in job interviews. Some people question this, as in a job interview the interviewer is doing most of the talking, and the applicant is using largely nonverbal gestures, such as eye contact, smiling, and nodding of the head. In actuality, what happens in those crucial first four minutes is more important than the applicant’s qualifications and work experience, as the interviewer is determining if the person would fit in well with the people he or she would be working with. If the person is being interviewed for a sales role, the interviewer would want to make sure the person would get on well with their customers.

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