Non-Verbal Communication

Since really nothing is going on right now, I thought I'd share a little thing I did for school this year. It's examples of non-verbal communcation. Kind of interesting I thought. ehe


The man smiled, but an uncomfortable expression lingered across his eyes. He leisurely draped his arm across the shoulders of the crying woman as if to comfort her, but his motions seemed stiff and forced and his arm looked very tight. After a few seconds he hurriedly removed his arm and brushed it absentmindedly across his shirt as if trying to remove something repulsive.

"Of course I’m not mad at you," Maggie remarked to me, her voice slightly dropping off at the end. She smiled at me, but her eyes looked like slits and seemed to bore into my head. She gave me a friendly thwack on the arm that stung and lasted much longer than it should have.

Sarah laughed a little too loudly at my suggestion. "Of course I don’t like him, silly!" she protested. "What a ridiculous idea!" Her cheeks had gone very red and she began picking her fingernails very earnestly. "So what did you think about that dessert huh?" she asked, hurriedly changing the subject. As we began to speak of this new subject, Sarah’s uptight expression vanished and she sank tiredly into a chair, an expression of pure relief on her face. She looked at anywhere but Dave for the rest of the evening.

The minute Steve walked into the room, James seemed to stiffen. He continued his barrage of light talking and bantering, but when Steve sat next to him he appeared to turn his chair about a fraction of an inch away from Steve. His hands kept balling into fists under the table and occasionally expressions of annoyance would flicker across his face. When Steve spoke to him he spoke back and smiled, but the smile seemed forced and his muscles were taught the whole time he spoke with Steve.

"Whatever," said Catherine indifferently, shrugging her shoulders. "It doesn’t bother me at all." She smiled at me, but her face had gone very red and a small tear trickled down her cheek. As if angry with herself, she swiftly rubbed her finger across her eye and muttered something about allergies. During the whole conversation she had her hands stuffed firmly in her pockets as if she were trying to contain herself.