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Sunday, December 11, 2005

Mini-Survey Body Language-by Selina

1.Introduction
Although verbal communication is very important in our daily life, we cannot overlook nonverbal communication--body language. People always use body language, for instance, raising their eyebrows, shaking their hands.
We went to the Student Center, and observed body language of American. The author of the book (Academic Encounters) said that people have universals of body language (Seal, 2002).Our group, W. Kinoshita and I, intended to observe what body language American usually uses.

2. Methods and Procedure
Both of us observed the same ten people, but I observed extra five people. I wanted to know whether American really used a lot of body language or not. I supposed that mouth could lie, but body could not. I observed fifteen people, four male and eleven female, at lease ten Americans. There were three White and one Hispanic in males, ten White and one Hispanic in females. I thought that Hispanic people had more body language than American.

3.Results
One hundred percent of people had body language. Males did less behaviors of touching their hair than females. One out of four of males (25%) touched their hair, while five out of eleven females (45.5%) did this. Both of males and females liked crossing their legs. Three males (75%) used this gesture, and eight females (72.7%) did this one too. Two out of four males (50%) lay to their girl friends with touching their noses, ears and chins as the expert said on the video. Two out of four males (50%) touched their partners!/s arms. But female did not do this.
In general, Americans used lots of different body language.

4.Discussion and Conclusion
I found that Americans used lots of body language. When some of them lay to others, their body language told the truth as we can see through the two male above. Females used to touch their hair more than males, and both of them crossed their legs. They used these gestures because they felt comfortable and relaxed. The male lovers touched their partners's arms to express their love.
If we did this survey again, we would ask some question about why they used this gesture, what was the relationship about the action!/s sender and the recipient. Did they think that the gesture would be helpful with their verbal communication? If someone lay to others, but did not touch nose, ears and chins, could we recognize it?

5.ReferenceSeal,B. (2002). Body language. Academic Encounters.

6.Appendix
Touching hair Crossing legs
Male 25% 75%
Female 45.5% 72.7%
Touching mouth,ears and chin Touching arms
Male 50% 50%

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