Social Hacking

  Quarnevalen's week is now over, and it was a really nice ride. One of the most fun things that I have done during my time at KTH (even though I did screw up in the end). What I would like to recommend to you people out there is to try things, don't be afraid of failure. Anyway, I am sorry for not updating in such a long, I will get right back to the subject.

  So today I had another seminar and a presentation in one of my courses. We had some really interesting discussions and I saw some interesting things. I am going to talk about body language in this post. Not the kind of body language that people consciously use. I am going to talk about the body language that we do subconsciously (pling post 10).

  A quick example from the seminar today was one person who answered maybe 5 questions in a row. I could tell if he was confident about his answer just by studying how he standing when answering. The first question he got he talked a while before he got to the answer. He sounded unsure in the beginning but then, towards the end of his reasoning, he was confident that he had given a good answer. Just as he made the transition between the first unsure part and the second "sure" part he shifted his weight and took another pose. I watched this during his other answers and it was surprisingly accurate. Giving his last answer he was in the "unsure" pose and the seminar leader just shot down his argument.

  As we stand (talking about us "humans"), we shift our weight to one leg at the time, letting the other leg rest. This is something we do subconsciously. What I have notice is that we also shift our weight when hesitate, or somehow get interrupted in our line of thought. When we have confidence in what we are saying we tend to stand firmly in one place.

  Another thing to look at is how someone eyes move. This is different from the weight shifting since is tends to differ much more from person to person. Try to define a pattern of movement for a person. When that person diverges from that pattern he or she is probably not that sure anymore.

  This can be done with any other body part besides the eyes. Look for something that breaks the pattern.

  So why am I telling you this? Well (you should have reached this conclusion) to win a discussion, you need to push for what you know and what your opponent doesn't know. If (When) you find something your opponent is unsure about, ask follow up questions.

  This can also be used in a more friendly way. Say that you are having a serious discussion with someone you know and that person repeatedly breaks his or her regular pattern of movement. This probably means that he or she is not comfortable with the subject and wants you to talk about something else. It can also be an indicator that something is troubling the person in question and he or she needs to talk about it. I'll leave that judgment up to you.

  That all I had for today. I will try to produce at least one more post this week, but I don't know if I will have the time. Thanks for reading!