The Ultimate Body Language Book

There are cues that can eliminate, or significantly reduce the possibility of confrontation. These
“readiness to submit” postures, are found in all animals where fighting could lead to injury or terminal
harm. Unlike humans, animals in the natural world lack hospitals, doctors and medicine so conflict is
risky, not to mention there might be very little upside to engaging in physical violence. Humans, while
we can usually recover from some of the most violent physical altercations, still possess the same
evolutionary hardwiring to avoid conflict when possible. Sometimes though, aggressive postures and
hence posturing can be beneficial to thwart an attack as the opponent decides whether or not physical
or verbal attack will bring them closer to their goals, or whether or not they target will make for an easy
prey. Avoiding conflict can be done using submissive postures too, and an intelligent person will see
that his pride will still remain intact. Submitting to others requires that a person realize that their
interests are better served by achieving their goals, in this case staying injury free, rather than
maintaining status.
To an instigator, the exact opposite goal is their motivation. They wish to torment and bully their way
into positions of authority usually for the exact reason that they have no other skills at their disposal.
The intelligent will use more sophisticated methods to win the arms race instead of physical violence.
Reduction in body size is a sure way to remain anonymous and melt into the background. Submission
in this way includes; “sinking in the chair” or pulling the arms inward, pulling the shoulders down and
rounding them, hunching in, pulling the chin in and pulling the legs or knees closer together. These
positions would be classified as closed body postures, as are most submissive postures. Reducing body
size is the exact opposite from what one would do to indicate dominance. Dominance is displayed by
taking up more space, being loose and free flowing, pushing the chin out, broadening our shoulders and
so forth. Remaining motionless and avoiding eye contact are other key features of a submissive
posture. What all these cues have in common is that they give us a better chance of being overlooked as
a threat, and help to repels attention from us.
Making the body small limits the potential of being hit and covers up vital areas of the body. In today’s
age, it is uncommon to be physically attacked, but the mechanism by which we display can have a big
impact on how people react physiologically to us. In other words, body language plays a big part in
how other’s perceive us even if we don’t know them, and so we can influence them to our advantage
even before a word is spoken. To avoid a speeding ticket, it has been shown that it is important to
immediately admit to being at fault and to do so emphatically. This might be counterintuitive as most
people think that admitting guilt is a sure way to get punished. However, denying culpability only
serves to instigate the officer forcing him to stand his ground even further. The best stance to avoid a
ticket, as we covered earlier, is to apologize, admit doing wrong, and incorporate submissive language
such as head down and palms up. If you still receive a ticket, it will be much less severe.