We, as humans, take our ability to comprehend and express language for granted. Humans are the only species on earth that has succeeded in creating their own symbolic language. We have the privilege of vocalizing our thoughts and communicating seamlessly. If we want water we ask for it. If we don't like something we can make it known. Whatever thought we have it can be communicated instantly to anyone whos listening. No other species can do this. To express the importance of language I conducted an experiment with two parts. For the first part, I spent 15 minutes participating in a conversation where I was not permitted to speak. For the second part of the experiment, I took part in a conversation where I may only use spoken language as my only means of communication. (This means no changes in body language or tone of voice)
My First conversation took place at work. When it was not busy I asked a couple of my co-workers to help me conduct this experiment. The topic of conversation was where we have traveled. The conversation started off normal. They were sharing stories and discussing the places they have traveled to. After everybody had their turn one of my co-workers asked me if I have traveled. I replied with a thumbs up to signal that I have. From there on my co-workers only asked me yes or no questions so that it would it wouldn’t be a constant cycle of guessing.
I had very little control over the conversation during this portion of the experiment. My co-workers determined which direction the conversation would go. The topics were initiated and changed by them solely because I could communicate my thoughts. There were times where I was excluded from the conversation completely just because I wouldn't be able to respond instantly. It was not purposeful but a conversation is a two-way street, well a three-way street in this case, that requires engagement from all parties. My coworkers definitely held the power in the conversation.
For the sake of this experiment, let's pretend that my coworkers and I represent two different cultures, one that uses spoken language(my coworkers), and one that doesn't(Me). The spoken culture has a direct advantage because they can instantly communicate their complex ideas within their population. The members of the larger speaking culture would believe they are more capable than the unspoken culture. The perfect example of this type of relationship would be our relationship with animals. We love our pets and they love us too but we are in control of their behavior and privileges. If they were able to speak our language and articulate their thoughts we would not treat them as pets we would treat them as peers.
For the second part of this experiment, The topic of discussion was where we wanted to travel to in the future as opposed to where we have been in the past. This portion of the experiment was conducted right after part one. The conversation started off well but right when I engaged my co-workers paid no attention to what I was saying but rather how I was saying it. One of them told me I sounded like a robot. The conversation progressed and one of my co-workers brought up how they would want to avoid traveling to a place that would be targeted by terrorists because of recent political turmoil in our world. I jumped in and replied “you can't live your life like that. That's what they want you to do, live in fear.” I saw my coworkers' reactions change throughout my sentence. Because they didn't receive any ques from my body language or vocal inflection, they could not decipher my emotions.
There are many aspects of communication such as tone inflection and body language and facial expressions that we don't even think of. These three aspects of communication are vital to communicating opinions and attitudes. When used in conjunction with verbal communication this gives us the ability to tell jokes, use sarcasm, and figurative language.
The adaptive benefit of possessing the ability to read body language is crucial in both animal society and human society. An example of this adaptive benefit in an animal society would be a rodent being able to acknowledge that when a rattlesnake shakes its tail, it means that it's about to attack. This will allow the rodents that do recognize this body language to survive, reproduce successfully, and continue to obtain resources. An example of how reading body language is an adaptive benefit in human society would be that those who can understand unspoked ques will get farther in their careers, and their relationships. This will help them make more money and maintain longer relationships.
There are people with Asperger's autism who do have difficulty reading body language. A situation where it would be beneficial to not be able to read someone's body language would be if you were to introduce yourself to someone. A persons body language doe not always correspond with their current emotions. A person could just look tired or upset when that may not be the case at. Being blind to body language keeps that person open to all relationships and opportunities.
My First conversation took place at work. When it was not busy I asked a couple of my co-workers to help me conduct this experiment. The topic of conversation was where we have traveled. The conversation started off normal. They were sharing stories and discussing the places they have traveled to. After everybody had their turn one of my co-workers asked me if I have traveled. I replied with a thumbs up to signal that I have. From there on my co-workers only asked me yes or no questions so that it would it wouldn’t be a constant cycle of guessing.
I had very little control over the conversation during this portion of the experiment. My co-workers determined which direction the conversation would go. The topics were initiated and changed by them solely because I could communicate my thoughts. There were times where I was excluded from the conversation completely just because I wouldn't be able to respond instantly. It was not purposeful but a conversation is a two-way street, well a three-way street in this case, that requires engagement from all parties. My coworkers definitely held the power in the conversation.
For the sake of this experiment, let's pretend that my coworkers and I represent two different cultures, one that uses spoken language(my coworkers), and one that doesn't(Me). The spoken culture has a direct advantage because they can instantly communicate their complex ideas within their population. The members of the larger speaking culture would believe they are more capable than the unspoken culture. The perfect example of this type of relationship would be our relationship with animals. We love our pets and they love us too but we are in control of their behavior and privileges. If they were able to speak our language and articulate their thoughts we would not treat them as pets we would treat them as peers.
For the second part of this experiment, The topic of discussion was where we wanted to travel to in the future as opposed to where we have been in the past. This portion of the experiment was conducted right after part one. The conversation started off well but right when I engaged my co-workers paid no attention to what I was saying but rather how I was saying it. One of them told me I sounded like a robot. The conversation progressed and one of my co-workers brought up how they would want to avoid traveling to a place that would be targeted by terrorists because of recent political turmoil in our world. I jumped in and replied “you can't live your life like that. That's what they want you to do, live in fear.” I saw my coworkers' reactions change throughout my sentence. Because they didn't receive any ques from my body language or vocal inflection, they could not decipher my emotions.
There are many aspects of communication such as tone inflection and body language and facial expressions that we don't even think of. These three aspects of communication are vital to communicating opinions and attitudes. When used in conjunction with verbal communication this gives us the ability to tell jokes, use sarcasm, and figurative language.
The adaptive benefit of possessing the ability to read body language is crucial in both animal society and human society. An example of this adaptive benefit in an animal society would be a rodent being able to acknowledge that when a rattlesnake shakes its tail, it means that it's about to attack. This will allow the rodents that do recognize this body language to survive, reproduce successfully, and continue to obtain resources. An example of how reading body language is an adaptive benefit in human society would be that those who can understand unspoked ques will get farther in their careers, and their relationships. This will help them make more money and maintain longer relationships.
There are people with Asperger's autism who do have difficulty reading body language. A situation where it would be beneficial to not be able to read someone's body language would be if you were to introduce yourself to someone. A persons body language doe not always correspond with their current emotions. A person could just look tired or upset when that may not be the case at. Being blind to body language keeps that person open to all relationships and opportunities.
Hello Jonah,
ReplyDeletePart 1:
I like that you conducted this experiment during work, getting paid for doing homework basically haha. I too found it difficult to ask or answer questions because with being limited to body language, one can only convey their attitude or mood towards something. Without the ability to verbally communicate, I found it easy to be left out in a conversation where the others can easily switch up the topics without acknowledging if I was ready. This gave me the sense that I was being left out and forgotten mid-conversation. Your co-workers had the power in this conversation because they dictated how they wanted the topics to go and also because they could throw their input into the mix by just blurting out their thoughts.
Part 2:
With the first part showing us how body language can only convey tone, I understand your struggle of not being able to exactly show how you felt towards something. Being monotone even when you want to express your attitude is a difficult thing to deal with because people won't exactly understand how you feel. I like the portion where you spoke about the rattler on a rattlesnake when it is about to attack. Although the snake doesn't have many verbal cues for when it feels threatened or when it wants to attack, the rattle is a universal sign for stay away from me. Verbal communication is important but without body language implemented at the same time, communication can be very awkward and sometimes hard to understand.
Part 1:
ReplyDeleteGood opening description of your first experiment and good discussion on the issue of power and control in the conversation.
I agree with your conclusion regarding the communication of complex ideas and the attitude of the speaking to the non-speaking culture.
Since this is an assignment on the evolution of human language, let's see if we can find a real-life example in human populations, since we don't expect our pets to speak. To find a real life example of this experiment, we need to find a situation where you have a speaking population and another group that doesn't speak that language, and this results in a power differential, with the speaking culture having power over the non-speaking. We see that in the interaction between English speakers and non-English speaking immigrant populations. Think about how non-English speaking immigrants are treated in Southern California? Are they treated as equals?
Part 2:
Good description of your experiment, particularly the description of your partners' response.
I don't disagree with your conclusions regarding the information we receive from body language, but you are only considering the situation where body language matches and supports the information you receive from spoken language. What does it tell you when the body language doesn't match the spoken language? Humans tend to use body language as a type of lie detector. If spoken words don't match with the body language, we are more inclined to believe the body language and doubt the words. Think about how being able to detect liars might help an individual's ability to survive and reproduce (which applies to the next section). The advantage of body language goes far beyond communicating emotion.
Okay on the benefits of body language, but what type of benefits do you get by being able to detect liars?
Yes, those in the autism spectrum represent a group that has great difficulty reading body language.
"A persons body language doe not always correspond with their current emotions."
Correct... but does that mean you should ignore the information you gain from reading the body language? As long as body language is giving you accurate information, I suggest it would never be a good idea to ignore what might be useful insight. But what if the information is NOT accurate, not because the person is lying with their body language, but because you can't read their body language? Do all cultures use the same system of body language? They all use different systems of spoken/written language, so why would we assume their body language isn't different? If you travel to another country, can you trust the information you get from their body language?
Part 1: I agree that it was very hard to communicate what I was thinking in my head through just the use of my hands and body language. There were times where I almost interrupted the experiment by using my voice because it was frustrating holding in all my thoughts and responses. For me and my partner it felt like he was talking the entire time and had stopped asking questions and turned the conversation one sided and also very awkward.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed your comparison to humans and their pets, and how if they communicated with us using our language then we could see them as peers and not pets. I agree to some extent, I guess I am having a harder time imaging that. But I do believe that body language is the universal language and it is the what we use to know what animals are communicating to us.
Part 2: I received a similar reaction while conducting the second part to the experiment, my partner started getting real bored during the conversation and seemed to not want to continue to be involved. I agree with the mundane emotion I was giving off during the conversation made it feel boring and lackluster. Facial expressions and voice dimension add to the conversation to make if feel more "human".
I also enjoyed your answer to why we cant assume assume body language. First impressions are a large factor when we need to get to know someone. We should never assume someones language relates back to their personality or who they are as a person because body language is just one layer to someones over-all self.
Hi! I enjoyed reading your introduction, because it was clear and entising. I also like that you did this experiment at work, which could give you a diffrent outlook as if you were doing it with a close fmaily member or a friend. I agree with you about how it was hard to fully get your point of what you were trying to say across. Overall, I enjoyed reading your post and found it very interesting!
ReplyDeleteHey Jonah!
ReplyDeleteFirst thing, I said hi to my girlfriend for you like you asked on my blog post assignment, she says hi back! Also, I personally thought this assignment was honestly extremely fun to do and I learned a lot not only about my partner but what life would be like without any sort of language. It was really cool to see that you were able to do this experiment at work due to the simplicity of it and the diversity that is achievable in this. I definitely feel that communities without language and expression of body language would for sure fall apart. Anyway, great job!