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Nonverbal Communication of Similarity Via the Torso: It’s in the Bag

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Abstract

The human body plays a central role in nonverbal communication, conveying attitudes, personality, and values during social interactions. Three experiments in a large, open classroom setting investigated whether the visibility of torso-located cues affects nonverbal communication of similarity. In Experiments 1 and 2, half the participants wore a black plastic bag over their torso. Participants interacted with an unacquainted same-sex individual selected from a large class who was also wearing (or also not wearing) a bag. Experiment 3 added a clear bag condition, in which visual torso cues were not obscured. Across experiments, black bag-wearing participants selected partners who were less similar to them on attitudes, behaviors, and personality compared to the bag-less—and clear bag—participants. Nonverbal cues in the torso communicate information about similarity of attitudes, behavior, and personality; the center of the body plays a surprisingly central role in early-stage person perception and attraction.

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Notes

  1. In all three experiments we tested for gender effects. There was no reliable pattern across the studies.

  2. We assessed 15 attitudes and eight behaviors with single items, and five personality dimensions with two items each.

  3. In the no bag condition, intraclass correlations (a measure of pair similarity) were not significantly different for variables measured during the in-class activity or measured online. This was true in all three experiments.

  4. We slightly over-assigned participants to the black bag condition to increase the power to detect a difference between the black bag condition and the two control conditions (clear bag and no bag). We randomly assigned 40 % of the sample to the black bag condition, 30 % to the clear bag condition, and 30 % to the no bag condition.

  5. The interaction term comparing the black bag condition to the no bag condition was b = −.09, SE = .07, t(129) = −1.41, p = .16, 95 % CI −.22 to .04. Despite our efforts to maximize power by slightly over-assigning participants to the black bag condition, the statistical tests of the two contrasts (comparing the black bag and the clear bag conditions to the no bag condition) have less power compared to the statistical tests reported in Experiments 1 and 2. Sample size was constrained by the number of students attending class on the day of the activity, and dividing the class into three rather than two conditions necessarily reduced power.

  6. The interaction term comparing the clear bag condition to the no bag condition was b = −.03, SE = .07, t(129) = −0.40, p = .69, 95 % CI −.16 to .10. This confirms that the degree of similarity within pairs in the clear bag condition was not significantly different from the no bag condition.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Wellesley College, 106 Central Street, Wellesley, MA, 02481, USA

    Angela J. Bahns & Jeremy B. Wilmer

  2. Department of Psychology, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS, USA

    Christian S. Crandall & Omri Gillath

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  1. Angela J. Bahns
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Correspondence to Angela J. Bahns.

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Bahns, A.J., Crandall, C.S., Gillath, O. et al. Nonverbal Communication of Similarity Via the Torso: It’s in the Bag. J Nonverbal Behav 40, 151–170 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10919-016-0227-y

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