Category: psychology
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Top Ten Things Every Presenter Needs To Know About People: #10 – People Imitate Your Emotions And Feelings
Your facial expressions and body language communicate information and affect how people react to you and your message. They can also cause other people to start feeling a certain way. People imitate what they see — If you are smiling, they will tend to smile; if you are energetic yet relaxed, then your audience will tend…
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Top Ten Things Every Presenter Needs To Know About People: #8 — People Are Energized When The Room Is Full
There are many subtle and not so subtle ways that people change when they are together. Human behavior is a complex combination of interactions with other people. When people enter a room that is largely empty they will tend to position themselves evenly throughout the room. This means that while they are waiting for the…
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Top 10 Things Every Presenter Needs To Know About People: #7 — People Assign Meaning To Your Hand Gestures
Everyone “talks” with their hands to some extent. Some people’s hand-talking or gesturing matches their message well. Other people have a tendency to make overly large gestures that can be distracting. Others don’t use their hands much at all. No matter which camp you fall into, it’s important to pay attention to your hand gestures…
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Top 10 Things Every Presenter Needs To Know About People: #6 — People Need To Feel Safe To Participate
The best performance I’ve ever been to (the best music, dance, theatre, speech — any kind of performance) was by Bobby McFerrin. His performances involve music and extensive audience interaction. I saw him in a 1500-seat theatre in a small city in Wisconsin. The theatre was full, and from the start the audience was appreciative…
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Top 10 Things Every Presenter Needs To Know About People: #5 — People assign meaning to your tone of voice
If you’ve ever eavesdropped on a conversation in a country where you did not speak the language, you might have been surprised to find yourself following along and picking up the feeling of the conversation even though you didn’t understand any of the words or literal meaning. This is an entire field of research, and it’s…
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Top 10 Things Every Presenter Needs To Know About People: #4 – People "read" your body positions instantly and unconsciously
Not too long ago I spoke at a conference with a line-up of great presenters. One man I had been looking forward to hearing got up to speak. He is well-known in his field, but I had never seen him speak. His talk was very good, but I couldn’t concentrate on it because throughout the…
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Top 10 Things Every Presenter Needs To Know About People: #3 – Multiple Sensory Channels Compete
Imagine that you are driving while listening to the radio and talking to a passenger sitting next to you. You are processing multiple sensory channels simultaneously. You are watching (the road), listening (to the radio and your friend), and thinking and talking. This doesn’t sound too difficult. People process multiple sensory channels all the time.…
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Top 10 Things Every Presenter Needs To Know About People: #2 – Writing By Hand Can Increase Commitment
I remember, many many years ago, when I wrote my Ph.D. thesis in graduate school, my first draft was done by hand (ok, now I’ve admitted that I’m quite old!). Most writing these days is done by typing on a keyboard. I write these blogs directly into my laptop using a keyboard, same thing with the…
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Experiences vs. Possessions: You Are What You've Done, Not What You Own
In the last few years psychology research (e.g. Carter & Gilovich, 2010) has proven what many of us have long suspected: that experiences (vacations, events with friends, etc) make people happier than buying and owning stuff (computers, clothes, etc). But more recent research by the same duo (Carter & Gilovich, 2012) shows that the experience…
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The Science of Happiness, Part 3: What commuting, graduate degrees and being single have in common
WARNING: The following discussion is about the correlation between happiness and many other factors. But it’s just correlation. The factors below are correlated with happiness, but that does not mean they CAUSE happiness. “Correlation does not imply causation”. Now that I’ve posted the warning, I can talk about some of the interesting correlations between happiness…
