MSNBC body language expert has Obama analysis? Really?

[IADEMO2004]

Is that a real profession? Off to Fox with you.

[jberryhill]

1. Next up....

[MANative]

2. While I'm not watching and can't/won't comment on what...

this individual is saying or the quality of his or her analysis, body language "reading" is a very real discipline founded in behavioralism and psychology. It was my course of study in grad school, and I use it daily in my work in skill development and instructional design. It's not the woo-woo baloney that untrained and uneducated people seem to think it is.

[loli phabay]

3. yup communicatoon is ninety five percent non verbal or something like that

To dismiss what annexpert says is to put yourself at a disadvantage.

[MANative]

6. Very close...

90 - 95% nonverbal, including eye contact, voice tone and inflection, breathing, body positioning, tics, tells, etc, etc, etc.

[Nostrathomas]

8. Poker tells

I wouldn't want to play poker at the same table as a body language expert.

[MANative]

9. My pals hate to play card games with me!

And my husband has never once managed to get a fib past me.

[LiberalFighter]

28. Would you be able to do the same with a person who believes their own lies?

If you had only known them for just a short period of time.

[MANative]

36. To some extent, yes, but not quite as accurately as

someone you know well, or someone who is conscious of deliberately lying. I've been doing this work for more than twenty years, so there aren't too many people who can fool me for long.

[LiberalFighter]

42. I had someone that I took their word until I got to know them better.

The only reason I knew she was lying was because I knew the truth. She did not exhibit any language to me that exhibit her lying. I think with her being all coked up and irresponsible she believed all her own lies.

[abumbyanyothername]

32. A universal characteristic of poker players

They universally believe that they play better than they actually play.

[MANative]

35. It's not that I AM any better; they just THINK I will be.

I actually suck at poker, because I can never remember the rules! LOL

[loves_dulcinea]

25. rofl

@ "woo-woo baloney". going to have to use that.

[Warpy]

4. I don't parade myself as an expert

but I watched with the sound off just for that reason.

Romney's rapid blinking gave him away. He was lying. He knew he was lying.

[Glitterati]

7. I'm curious

what you thought of Obama's body language.

I got sheer disgust. He seemed to be waiting for the moderator to control Romney and his outbursts.

Bottom line, he was waiting for the moderator to do his job.

[Blue_In_AK]

10. I saw bemusement

[abumbyanyothername]

37. I saw a person

desperately wanting to roll his eyes but holding back.

[Blue_In_AK]

38. Exactly.

[Warpy]

33. I got that too

I also thought he looked terribly tired, like the situation between Turkey and Syria had kept him up all night and he'd only had a short nap.

And yes, there were quick expressions of sheer disgust going across his face as Romney was speaking.

[Nostrathomas]

11. Observation

Romney indeed was blinking in rapid fashion and slung many untruths, however Obama's body language was more disturbing. Obama, most of the debate, looked like he was about to cry when Romney attacked. That isn't a stretch. He didn't appear eager to defend his record or Romney's assertions. I really think the President didn't prepare as well as he should have. It was like he went to a job interview either thinking it was a formality for a job that's in the bag or a job he couldn't care less if he got.

[OregonBlue]

12. I watched with the sound off because I couldn't listen to Romney's lies.

Romney looked very nervous, blinking and jittery. Obama looked both tired and disgusted with his opponent. I suspect there were so many lies flying so fast, he decided not to respond. Let the press "fact check".

[Glitterati]

16. Oh, I disagree entirely

except the part about Romney lying.

As for Obama, about to cry? Seriously, you're just being silly, right?

[Indpndnt]

19. Well, bummer.

Tombstoned already, so we won't get any answers. Not that we didn't already know what was up with that one.

Crying. That poster wasn't even trying hard.

[Glitterati]

21. Bwahahahahaha

Like we didn't see THAT one coming.

[Indpndnt]

17. What the heck were you watching?

Obama looked disgusted with Willard's lies and behavior. Bemused, at times. Never about to cry and certainly never as if he didn't care.

Interesting take you've got there.

[ohheckyeah]

40. Obama looked like he was about to cry?

Seriously

[DonViejo]

5. Body Language Expert: Romney ‘Hyperactive,’ Obama ‘Measured’ in Debate

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1251119268

[DavidDvorkin]

13. It's pseudoscientific garbage

And quite popular on DU.

[MANative]

15. No, it isn't. My MS degree says otherwise.

And I'm offended at the implication that my life's work is "pseudo" anything. Learn something before you dismiss a discipline about which you apparently know nothing.

[DavidDvorkin]

18. You have an MS degree in Body Language?

[MANative]

22. In Biological Cognition, the technical term for

the study of brain, behavior and perception. People who don't understand it call it body language. And it's very real.

[Indpndnt]

23. Yes, it certainly is real.

I learned a few techniques (and observational insights) in a mgt. class and darned if they didn't work as predicted. I went from bemused skeptic to amused believer.

[MANative]

26. It's used in numerous lines of work as a technical tool and isn't nearly as "out there"

as people think. Just a tiny list of places where this is used: education design (where I use it, and where my sub-specialty is the study and practice of Proxemics - how people relate to each other in physical space), police and security work, psychiatry and psychology, prisons and correction, and yes, politics. It's also used by people intuitively everyday in numerous ways, from when we know our kids are lying to us, to when we know someone feels uncomfortable about a conversation, to when we know someone is interested in us for whatever purpose, and even extending all the way to the animal world. How do you know your cat is pissed off? Her ears are back.

[Indpndnt]

30. We learned to do (or watch for) certain things in meetings or negotiations.

Or to see if people are making up numbers if they look up with their eyes to the wrong side - the side where memory of numbers would not be located. (Yep, it was a long time ago! )

[DavidDvorkin]

24. And did they teach you that people blink a lot when they're lying?

And similar stuff, as we see paraded here on DU?

[MANative]

29. That is one tiny, itty bitty tool that is used to determine untruthfulness.

Others include the direction one's eyes look when lying versus being truthful (looking up and to the right indicates accessing creative thought - lying, while looking to the left tends to indicate accessing memory - truthfulness), increase in pulse and respiration (usually measured medically, but can be observable in extreme cases), shift in body position away from the target of speech, etc.

[Indpndnt]

31. Hey, I just posted above about the eyes and memory!

Great timing!

[DavidDvorkin]

39. Not according to this study

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2172119/Lying-eyes-myth--looking-right-DOESNT-mean-fibbing-say-scientists-video-study.html

All of those supposed giveaways sound like baseless received wisdom to me.

[MANative]

41. Give me a topic and I can find three studies to support it and three to refute it.

Physiological testing that I've observed, participated in, and researched personally say otherwise. You seem bent on refusing to believe this discipline is legitimate. Your problem, not mine.

[Shankapotomus]

27. I'd be interested to know if

a body language expert can control their own body language?

[MANative]

34. Much better than the average bear, but not entirely.

The very first thing I learned in my first undergrad course on the subject was that anytime there is a disconnect between words and "body language," believe what the body says, because it's so much more difficult to control consciously. People diagnosed as psychopathic or sociopaths, however, are much harder to read without physiological measurement tools, because they don't communicate they same way as others. They have less of a "conscience" and thus don't display the same physical tells.

[Shankapotomus]

43. Well, it's comforting to know

all my embarrassing personal history is open to the plain view of a body language expert with a couple of questions.

[lpbk2713]

14. Hey Mitt, try this out for body language ...

[Chorophyll]

20. Gotta fill up that 24 hours with something, don't they.

And substantive reporting just won't do.