Neuroscience of feedback (4 of 5)

Body language and non-verbal feedback – When having a conversation with someone, you may sometimes wonder if they are actually engaged by what you are saying. You may look to their body language for clues, but what exactly are you supposed to look for? Luckily, neuroscience has the answer.

This video clip shows us another social experiment, involving two actors separated into two rooms, where each has several simple conversations with other participants. Both men are dressed the same, talking about the same things, and even moving in the same way. There is only one difference between them – one is being deliberately likeable (Mr Nice), and one is being deliberately unlikeable (Mr Nasty).

The extraordinary thing was that once the conversations had developed enough, the participants who were speaking to Mr Nice gradually began to copy his actions, whereas the same did not happen for Mr Nasty.

This phenomenon of subconsciously copying the actions of someone we have a rapport with is useful in a workplace, where it is useful to know if what you are saying is being listened to and whether responses by a colleague are authentic.