A lot of our unconscious habits can actually reveal how a lot about our personality. From your signature to your shoes, everything can tell others a lot how you think, feel and function. The latest thing to be added to this list is the way you walk. According to a recent study published in Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, the way you walk may reveal your aggressive tendencies! The researchers from the University of Portsmouth have written “To most people walking is a relatively automatic behavior yet it is reflective of individual psychology.”
For the study, 29 participants were asked to walk on a treadmill for 60 seconds. They had to walk as they normally would, using their natural style and speed, while wearing reflective markers attached to their upper and lower body, legs, and feet. Using motion capture technology, each person’s movements were recorded to create three-dimensional models that helped analyze thorax and pelvic movements, as well as the speed of their gaits. Then these 29 participants were asked to complete questionnaires that would help understand their personalities better. The questionnaires used by the researchers were Buss–Perry Aggression Questionnaire which helps measure aggression and the Big Five Inventory which measures five traits – conscientiousness, agreeableness, neuroticism, openness to experience, and extraversion.
After comparing the participants’ answers to their walks, the researchers determined that “the increased relative movement of the thorax (upper body) and pelvis (lower body) together was reflective of increased physical aggression. When walking, the body naturally rotates a little. As an individual steps forward with their left foot, the left side of the pelvis will move forward with the leg and the left shoulder will move back and the right shoulder forward to maintain balance. Put simply, an aggressive walk is one where this rotation is exaggerated.”
However, the speed of the person’s walk had no significance in determining any personality traits. While “there was a moderate correlation between gait speed and aggression for males,” the authors write, there was no connection between between gait speed and aggression for females or the sample as a whole. Ultimately, this study confirms that body language can speak volumes.
A real-world application that the researchers want to use this is for crime prevention. They believe that training closed-circuit TV observers to recognize an “aggressive” walk could help detect ‘high risk’ targets in a crowd!
Another thing that the research reveals the importance of first impressions. People will judge you by little things like your walk and this could totally influence how they feel about you and how they react towards you.
Boy, that’s a lot to consider!
