Words, Tone of Voice, and Body Language, Reconsidered
You’ve undoubtedly heard it claimed that the meaning of your message is communicated by:
- Your words — 7%
- Your tone of voice — 38%
- Your body language — 55%.
Well, don’t believe it.
Olivia Mitchell at Speaking about Presenting always has interesting and insightful things to say about presenting. She’s done a masterful job this week describing the research (performed by Albert Mehrabian in the 1960′s) that gives rise to that claim.
She’s also examined how the research has been misinterpreted and misapplied ever since. I couldn’t do justice to what she has written by summing it up, so please read for yourself her original post (be sure to check out the comments) and her follow-up post.
Max Atkinson, whose blog is also always worth reading, addresses the same study and rebuts its most common misinterpretations. See his comments on “Body Language and Non-Verbal Communication.”
Bert Decker offers his analysis, which differs from what both Olivia and Max write (and from what I believe). But it’s well worth reading.
Tags: Mehrabian, non-verbal communication, style
June 14th, 2009 at 7:35 pm
[...] Chris Witt – Words, tone of voice and body language reconsidered [...]
June 15th, 2009 at 9:44 am
Hi Chris, thought you might be interested in reading my take on Mehrabian, which caused quite a stir last summer when it was published on Trainingzone.co.uk. The link is http://www.trainingzone.co.uk/item/184720 You have to register on the site to read it – which is free. Alternatively, you can read it on my website at http://www.creativityworks.net/page4/page6/page6.html I’d love to know what you think of it.
June 15th, 2009 at 1:52 pm
Martin,
I love the article and recommend it highly. You might want to forward it to Olivia. She’s compiling a list of people in her campaign agaist the misuse of Mehrabian.
I also love your website. I think you and I have a lot in common in our approach to speaking. Keep it up. And thanks for sharing your article.
Chris
June 15th, 2009 at 3:28 pm
Chris,
Thanks for your encouraging comments. We (Martha and I) think of you as a kindred spirit too – and we’d be very interested at looking at ways we might support each other in the work we do. At the moment I’m setting up a “Words that Move Mountains” blog – I’ll let you know when it goes live, and I’ll add a link to your blog too.
Now I’m off to read your latest post – I’m very interested in the topic of memory and memorability.
Cheers,
Martin
July 22nd, 2009 at 8:45 am
[...] already written here about the misinterpretation of a study done by Mehrabian, which would have you believe that the [...]
October 19th, 2009 at 1:29 am
Вообще, честно говоря, комментарии тут гораздо занимательней самих сообщений. (Не в обиду автору, конечно
)