In humans, posture can provide a significant amount of important information through nonverbal communication. Psychological studies have also demonstrated the effects of body posture on emotions. This research can be traced back to Charles Darwin's studies of emotion and movement in humans and animals. Currently, many studies have shown that certain patterns of body movements are indicative of specific emotions. Researchers studied sign language and found that even non-sign language users can determine emotions from only hand movements. Another example is the fact that anger is characterized by forward whole body movement. The theories that guide research in this field are the self-validation or perception theory and the embodied emotion theory.
Self-validation theory is when a participant's posture has a significant effect on their self-evaluation of their emotions. An example of this is an experiment where participants had to think and then write positive qualities of themselves in a confident or doubtful posture. Participants then had to self-evaluate on how good a job candidate, interviewee, performer, and how satisfied they would be as an employee. Mood and confidence level were also measured. Results from this study proved in favor of the self-validation theory. Participants' attitudes in the confident but not doubtful posture significantly affected their self-reported attitudes. A similar study showed that participants who were placed in a hunched posture reported were more likely to feel stressed compared to participants who assumed a relaxed position. Embodied emotion theory is the idea that mental events can be represented by states of the body. In a study showing embodied emotion, participants were primed with concepts of pride and disappointment by a word generation task. Researchers hypothesized there would be an observable change in participants' posture based on the word they were primed with. This hypothesis was confirmed for the disappointment prime because participants were more likely to decrease in their vertical height or show slumping behavior.
Common methods
Physical posture and emotion have been studied using two similar techniques. The first method involves the participant viewing videotaped actors performing certain actions and the second method involves having the participant sit in a certain posture and then self-reporting their emotions. In the first method, actors portray and record certain body movements. Participants must view the video and decipher the emotion they believe is being portrayed. In the second method, participants are told to assume a certain body posture and then must complete a survey on their current affective state. Other methods include using neuroscience techniques, such as fMRI's to determine how posture and emotions expressions can affect brain imaging. Another method that is growing in use involves using dancers as 'actors' and having participants observe and determine the emotion the dancer is conveying.
Communication expressed
In humans, one of the means of communication is the posture of the body, in addition to facial expressions, personal distances, gestures and body movements. Posture conveys information about: Interpersonal relations Personality traits such as confidence, submissiveness, and openness. Social standing Current emotional states Characteristics of temperament according to the theory of Hippocrates, Kretschmer, and Sheldon.
Analysis
Posture can signal both the enduring characteristics of a person (character, temperament, etc.), and his or her current emotions and attitudes. Therefore, posture can be considered in the context of a given situation, and independently of it.
Changing factors
Posture as information about the current state of a person's emotions and attitudes should be analyzed in the context of other messages, both verbal and nonverbal as well as that person's cultural and social norms.