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What Every Body Is Saying: An Ex-FBI Agent's Guide to Speed-Reading People

Joe Navarro, Marvin Karlins · 9 HN comments
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Amazon Summary
Read this book and send your nonverbal intelligence soaring. Joe Navarro, a former FBI counterintelligence officer and a recognized expert on nonverbal behavior, explains how to "speed-read" people: decode sentiments and behaviors, avoid hidden pitfalls, and look for deceptive behaviors. You'll also learn how your body language can influence what your boss, family, friends, and strangers think of you. You will discover: The ancient survival instincts that drive body language Why the face is the least likely place to gauge a person's true feelings What thumbs, feet, and eyelids reveal about moods and motives The most powerful behaviors that reveal our confidence and true sentiments Simple nonverbals that instantly establish trust Simple nonverbals that instantly communicate authority Filled with examples from Navarro's professional experience, this definitive book offers a powerful new way to navigate your world... He says that's his best offer. Is it? She says she agrees. Does she? The interview went great—or did it? He said he'd never do it again. But he did.
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Hacker News Stories and Comments

All the comments and stories posted to Hacker News that reference this book.
"What Every BODY Is Saying: An Ex-FBI Agent’s Guide to Speed-Reading People", written by a former FBI counterintelligence officer, is pretty interesting, though not scientific:

https://amzn.com/0061438294

tamana
That's on my bookshelf next to "Polygraph Interpretation for Dummies"
chillacy
Ah I remember after I read that in high school I would overanalyze social interactions. Overtime they started becoming more subconscious and automatic so it doesn't get in the way. Today I can point out the reason why I find someone standoffish or sad based on body language, where my extraverted friends who never formalized their knowledge can know what they're feeling but not necessarily formulate why it is.
JohnBooty

    where my extraverted friends who never formalized their
    knowledge can know what they're feeling but not    
    necessarily formulate why it is.
Haha yeah. It reminds me of the way that non-native English speakers often have an understanding of English that is deeper and more formal than native English speakers.

(I am sure that this happens with all languages; English is simply the one I have experience with)

The way we position our bodies dramatically influences -- and is influenced by -- our subconscious. This article has a lot of really interesting applications in psychotherapy of the body influencing the mind!

This article reminds me of a book I read a few years ago, Joe Navarro's "What Every Body Is Saying" [1]. If you're in the business of working with people more than programs, this book might be useful, but even if not, a lot of it was a good intellectual curiosity. There were plenty of things that I got to try noticing and playing with on my own body; for instance, how I hold my hands in any given situation (palms out? palms in?) is a good indicator of how comfortable I am, and it's an interesting experiment to "force" myself to place my hands somewhere other than where they naturally lie, and just lightly observe how it makes me more or less comfortable. (If you're bored in a meeting, I highly recommend giving it a try.)

Thanks for this link.

[1] http://www.amazon.com/What-Every-BODY-Saying-Speed-Reading/d...

I failed a job interview recently where the interviewer seemed much less comfortable than me with eye contact. He was fidgeting constantly and only briefly looking into my eyes and then quickly looking away. On the other hand, I remained confident, composed and was perfectly comfortable maintaining eye contact.

On paper, the interview went great and I had no problems with the whiteboard questions or any of the other questions. However, his body language was clearly not vibing with mine. He may have felt I came off too aggressive and overconfident. For the record, I did not think it was confrontational, in fact the conversation itself was pretty easy going and fun as far as technical interviews go.

I've been thinking about it and trying to come up with a way of calibrating my body language in the moment to make the other person more at ease. If anyone has any suggestions on reading, I'd love to hear them. I've read that FBI agent's book [1] since then and found it a little bit helpful, but nothing earthshattering. The author is more concerned with cracking/breaking people than making them comfortable.

[1] http://www.amazon.com/What-Every-BODY-Saying-Speed-Reading/d...

bootload
"The author is more concerned with cracking/breaking people than making them comfortable."

Incorrect. The author is retired FBI Agent, Joe Navarro, [0] an expert on reading and interpreting non-verbal body language. One of the cornerstone of non-verbals, explained in WEBIS, is the comfort/discomfort paradigm. [1],[2]

Is a person comfortable? Why not? Is there a mismatch between verbal communication and non-verbal actions? This is where rapport comes in, the ability to make someone feel at ease and something taught by the FBI when interviewing. They don't "break" people, they charm them by putting them at ease, let them drop their guard and inquire further. The earth shattering point of WEBIS is everybody exhibits these body language responses and I consider it to be a sort of human response API regardless of country, age or sex.

As for eye contact. Hold too little contact and you appear submissive. Too much and you may be signalling to another person you are aggressive.

[0] backgrounder by Octavio Blanco "This former FBI spy hunter fled Cuba at age 9" ~ http://money.cnn.com/2015/10/27/news/economy/joe-navarro-cub...

[1] Navarro, 2007.

[2] read Charles Fifield, "Setting the Sale Through Persuasive Communication" http://www.baylor.edu/business/kellercenter/news.php?action=...

kingkawn
This kind of analysis feels flawed because people from different cultures have different body language.
andrewflnr
There are differences, but there are also some [near-]universals. Have you read the book?
sleazebreeze
Thanks for the links, I'm reading them now. I appreciate the informative correction to my previous post.

I confess I must have misread his points because many of the stories are about criminal interrogations (although there are plenty of business stories too). I just bought his other book Louder Than Words and I will be reading that looking for the charm/rapport aspect instead of "breaking".

flycaliguy
Definitely find a copy of Impro by Keith Johnstone. Most likely the source of the poster's improv games. Really a lot of great insight about status and how to play status like a game.
akamaka
This book is so different from what I normally read that I would have never considered picking it up, but it seems to have only glowing reviews. Thanks for the suggestion!
sleazebreeze
This seems like a very unique book, thank you for the suggestion! I'll be reading this one for sure.
nmc
The Internet Archived has referenced this full scan of the book on PDF.yt: http://pdf.yt/d/KIkLrSPi_3lzPl5v

No idea how legal this is though, download at your own risk.

davorb
Try mirroring his body language next time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirroring_(psychology)

kingkawn
If someone is uncomfortable with eye contact I try to make less of it while still being engaged in listening.
brudgers
From the description, I would not be surprised if the cause for the interviewer's behavior was that the decision had already been made to hire someone else. Eye contact patterns, if they have significance, probably reflect some internal state, e.g. confidence.
Fascinating. The way you describe navigating the world based on people's expressions is similar to how Joe Navarro described his experience. He immigrated to America when a youth and knew no English at the time, forcing him to rely on reading body language to understand what was going on. He went on to be an FBI interrogator and used the skills he developed in reading body language in evaluating the truthfulness of those he questioned.

Navarro wrote a book called "What Every Body is Saying".[0] In it he identifies a number of universal body language patterns and sets out guides for interpreting what they mean based on context.

[0] http://www.amazon.com/What-Every-BODY-Saying-Speed-Reading/d...

This book is a decent guide to decoding body language (including, but not limited to, deception): http://www.amazon.com/What-Every-BODY-Saying-Speed-Reading/d...

The author's approach is that you must observe a "baseline" of what is normal behavior for an individual in order to accurately read body language. He suggests looking for deviations from normal behavior along with clusters.

As a great practical guide to reading and applying body language, I'd recommend "What everybody is saying" by Dave Navarro. Guy used to do body language analysis for the FBI afaik, and then wrote a book about it.

http://www.amazon.com/What-Every-BODY-Saying-Speed-Reading/d...

Concerning the body language tips the article recomends, I think everyone except arms crossed behind head is covered for in the book. Arm akimbo, crossed legs, etc.

As a personal tip, I'd give the thumbs up. No, like actually stretch your thumbs out when you walk around or talk to people, and leave them out of your pockets. It's ok to put the rest of the hand in, but the thumbs stay out.

Ahh, and if you're arguing, even if you want to, don't start undressing yourself, no matter how angry you are. 2 people arguing and taking jackets and shirts off usually means business you don't want to be part of neccesairily.

robbyking
Joe Navarro also wrote an excellent book on how to read poker tells called "Read 'em and Reap."

The books emphasises the importance of identifying behavioral patterns and recognizing deviations due to stress/confidence.

Evbn
Which is in direct contradiction to OP's claim that everyone on Earth has the exact same set of tells.
imissmyjuno
I've finished that book and I think it could be edited down to a quarter of its length. useful but the page count is highly inflated
None
None
InvisibleCities
by Dave Navarro

I think you mean Joe Navarro, unless the guitarist from Jane's Addiction and RHCP has led a far richer life than I previously imagined.

solistice
I always get his name wrong, sorry for that. Yes, Joe Navarro.
One that I would recommend is What Every BODY is Saying: An Ex-FBI Agent's Guide to Speed-Reading People http://www.amazon.com/What-Every-BODY-Saying-Speed-Reading/d...
Consider reading these: http://www.amazon.com/What-Every-BODY-Saying-Speed-Reading/d... http://www.amazon.com/Definitive-Book-Body-Language/dp/05538...
exch
Interesting. I'll see if these can be useful to me.
sayemm
The first book looks really interesting, thanks for sharing.

I'm also a huge fan of "Caro's Book of Poker Tells" - http://www.amazon.com/Caros-Book-Poker-Tells-Mike/dp/1580420...

Poker, I find, is a great way to train yourself to read people and their emotions.

Whether you get along with that person or not depends on what's important to you.

There is a great book about body language called What Every Body is Saying by an ex-FBI agent. Excellent read and be forewarned that you'll start seeing other people in a very different light. Heck, it will make you think twice about what and how you say things. On Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/What-Every-BODY-Saying-Speed-Reading/d... .

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