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Power Posing

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Encyclopedia of Personality and Individual Differences

Synonyms

Expansive nonverbal display; High-power body postures; Nonverbal display of power; Postural expansiveness

Definition

Power posing is the nonverbal expression of power. High power poses can be seen in open, expansive body postures, whereas low power poses are characterized by contractive, slumped body postures.

Introduction

What happens if people do not actually possess power but still display it? This is the basic idea of power posing. Based on reasoning in the field of embodiment, it is assumed that certain body postures lead to changes in psychological variables. Power posing is a relatively new construct in the field of embodiment and connects the concepts of body posture and power. A distinction is made between high- and low-power poses. High-power poses include expansive body postures such as standing tall with the chest out and hands on the hips. Low-power poses are represented by slumped, contractive body postures (Carney et al. 2010) and convey the impression of...

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Correspondence to Robert Körner .

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Körner, R., Schütz, A. (2019). Power Posing. In: Zeigler-Hill, V., Shackelford, T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Personality and Individual Differences. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-28099-8_2323-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-28099-8_2323-1

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  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-28099-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-28099-8

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