WEBVTT

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Translator: Joseph Geni
Reviewer: Morton Bast

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So I want to start by offering
you a free no-tech life hack,

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and all it requires of you is this: that
you change your posture for two minutes.

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But before I give it away,
I want to ask you to right now

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do a little audit of your body
and what you're doing with your body.

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So how many of you are sort
of making yourselves smaller?

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Maybe you're hunching, crossing
your legs, maybe wrapping your ankles.

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Sometimes we hold onto our arms like this.

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Sometimes we spread out.
(Laughter) I see you.

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So I want you to pay attention
to what you're doing right now.

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We're going to come back
to that in a few minutes,

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and I'm hoping that if you
learn to tweak this a little bit,

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it could significantly change
the way your life unfolds.

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So, we're really fascinated
with body language,

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and we're particularly interested
in other people's body language.

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You know, we're interested in,
like, you know — (Laughter) —

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an awkward interaction, or a smile,

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or a contemptuous glance,
or maybe a very awkward wink,

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or maybe even something like a handshake.

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Narrator: Here they are
arriving at Number 10.

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This lucky policeman gets to shake hands
with the President of the United States.

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Here comes the Prime Minister -- No.
(Laughter) (Applause)

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(Laughter) (Applause) Amy Cuddy: So
a handshake, or the lack of a handshake,

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can have us talking
for weeks and weeks and weeks.

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Even the BBC and The New York Times.

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So obviously when we think
about nonverbal behavior,

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or body language -- but we call it
nonverbals as social scientists --

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it's language, so we
think about communication.

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When we think about communication,
we think about interactions.

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So what is your body
language communicating to me?

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What's mine communicating to you?

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And there's a lot of reason to believe
that this is a valid way to look at this.

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So social scientists
have spent a lot of time

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looking at the effects
of our body language,

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or other people's body
language, on judgments.

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And we make sweeping judgments
and inferences from body language.

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And those judgments can predict
really meaningful life outcomes

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like who we hire or promote,
who we ask out on a date.

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For example, Nalini Ambady,
a researcher at Tufts University,

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shows that when people watch
30-second soundless clips

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of real physician-patient interactions,

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their judgments
of the physician's niceness

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predict whether or not
that physician will be sued.

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So it doesn't have to do so much

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with whether or not that
physician was incompetent,

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but do we like that person
and how they interacted?

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Even more dramatic,
Alex Todorov at Princeton

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has shown us that judgments
of political candidates' faces

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in just one second predict 70 percent

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of U.S. Senate and gubernatorial race
outcomes, and even, let's go digital,

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emoticons used well in online negotiations

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can lead you to claim more
value from that negotiation.

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If you use them poorly, bad idea. Right?

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So when we think of nonverbals,
we think of how we judge others,

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how they judge us
and what the outcomes are.

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We tend to forget,
though, the other audience

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that's influenced by our nonverbals,
and that's ourselves.

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We are also influenced by our nonverbals,

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our thoughts and our feelings
and our physiology.

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So what nonverbals am I talking about?

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I'm a social psychologist.
I study prejudice,

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and I teach at a competitive
business school,

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so it was inevitable that I would
become interested in power dynamics.

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I became especially interested
in nonverbal expressions

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of power and dominance.

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And what are nonverbal
expressions of power and dominance?

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Well, this is what they are. So in the
animal kingdom, they are about expanding.

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So you make yourself big, you stretch out,

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you take up space,
you're basically opening up.

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It's about opening up. And this
is true across the animal kingdom.

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It's not just limited to primates.

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And humans do the same thing. (Laughter)

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So they do this both when they
have power sort of chronically,

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and also when they're feeling
powerful in the moment.

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And this one is especially
interesting because it really shows us

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how universal and old these
expressions of power are.

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This expression, which is known
as pride, Jessica Tracy has studied.

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She shows that people
who are born with sight

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and people who are
congenitally blind do this

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when they win at a physical competition.

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So when they cross the finish
line and they've won,

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it doesn't matter if they've
never seen anyone do it.

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They do this. So the arms up in the V,
the chin is slightly lifted.

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What do we do when we feel powerless?

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We do exactly the opposite.
We close up. We wrap ourselves up.

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We make ourselves small. We don't want
to bump into the person next to us.

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So again, both animals
and humans do the same thing.

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And this is what happens when you
put together high and low power.

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So what we tend to do
when it comes to power

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is that we complement
the other's nonverbals.

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So if someone is being
really powerful with us,

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we tend to make ourselves smaller.
We don't mirror them.

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We do the opposite of them. So I'm
watching this behavior in the classroom,

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and what do I notice?

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I notice that MBA students really exhibit
the full range of power nonverbals.

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So you have people who are
like caricatures of alphas,

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really coming into the room,
they get right into the middle of the room

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before class even starts,
like they really want to occupy space.

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When they sit down,
they're sort of spread out.

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They raise their hands like this.

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You have other people who
are virtually collapsing

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when they come in.
As soon they come in, you see it.

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You see it on their faces
and their bodies,

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and they sit in their chair
and they make themselves tiny,

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and they go like this when
they raise their hand.

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I notice a couple of things about this.

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One, you're not going to be surprised.

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It seems to be related to gender.

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So women are much more likely
to do this kind of thing than men.

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Women feel chronically less powerful
than men, so this is not surprising.

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But the other thing I noticed is that it
also seemed to be related to the extent

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to which the students were participating,
and how well they were participating.

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And this is really important
in the MBA classroom,

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because participation
counts for half the grade.

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So business schools have been
struggling with this gender grade gap.

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You get these equally qualified
women and men coming in

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and then you get these
differences in grades,

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and it seems to be partly
attributable to participation.

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So I started to wonder, you know, okay,

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so you have these people coming
in like this, and they're participating.

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Is it possible that we
could get people to fake it

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and would it lead them
to participate more?

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So my main collaborator Dana
Carney, who's at Berkeley,

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and I really wanted to know,
can you fake it till you make it?

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Like, can you do this
just for a little while

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and actually experience a behavioral
outcome that makes you seem more powerful?

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So we know that our nonverbals
govern how other people

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think and feel about us.
There's a lot of evidence.

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But our question really was,

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do our nonverbals govern how we
think and feel about ourselves?

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There's some evidence that they do.

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So, for example,
we smile when we feel happy,

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but also, when we're forced to smile

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by holding a pen in our teeth
like this, it makes us feel happy.

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So it goes both ways. When it comes
to power, it also goes both ways.

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So when you feel powerful,
you're more likely to do this,

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but it's also possible that when
you pretend to be powerful,

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you are more likely
to actually feel powerful.

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So the second question
really was, you know,

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so we know that our minds
change our bodies,

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but is it also true that
our bodies change our minds?

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And when I say minds, in the case
of the powerful, what am I talking about?

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So I'm talking about thoughts and feelings

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and the sort of physiological things
that make up our thoughts and feelings,

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and in my case, that's hormones.
I look at hormones.

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So what do the minds of the powerful
versus the powerless look like?

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So powerful people tend
to be, not surprisingly,

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more assertive and more
confident, more optimistic.

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They actually feel they're going
to win even at games of chance.

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They also tend to be able
to think more abstractly.

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So there are a lot of differences.
They take more risks.

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There are a lot of differences
between powerful and powerless people.

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Physiologically,
there also are differences

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on two key hormones: testosterone,
which is the dominance hormone,

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and cortisol, which is the stress hormone.

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So what we find is that high-power
alpha males in primate hierarchies

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have high testosterone and low cortisol,
and powerful and effective leaders

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also have high testosterone
and low cortisol.

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So what does that mean?
When you think about power,

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people tended to think
only about testosterone,

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because that was about dominance.

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But really, power is also
about how you react to stress.

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So do you want the high-power
leader that's dominant,

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high on testosterone,
but really stress reactive?

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Probably not, right? You want the person
who's powerful and assertive and dominant,

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but not very stress reactive,
the person who's laid back.

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So we know that in primate hierarchies,

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if an alpha needs to take over,

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if an individual needs to take
over an alpha role sort of suddenly,

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within a few days,
that individual's testosterone has gone up

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significantly and his cortisol
has dropped significantly.

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So we have this evidence,
both that the body can shape

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the mind, at least at the facial level,

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and also that role
changes can shape the mind.

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So what happens, okay,
you take a role change,

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what happens if you do
that at a really minimal level,

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like this tiny manipulation,
this tiny intervention?

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"For two minutes," you say,
"I want you to stand like this,

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and it's going to make
you feel more powerful."

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So this is what we did.

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We decided to bring people into
the lab and run a little experiment,

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and these people adopted, for two minutes,

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either high-power poses
or low-power poses,

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and I'm just going to show you five of
the poses, although they took on only two.

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So here's one.

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A couple more.

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This one has been dubbed
the "Wonder Woman" by the media.

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Here are a couple more. So you can
be standing or you can be sitting.

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And here are the low-power poses.

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So you're folding up,
you're making yourself small.

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This one is very low-power.

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When you're touching your neck,
you're really protecting yourself.

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So this is what happens.
They come in, they spit into a vial,

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for two minutes, we say,
"You need to do this or this."

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They don't look at pictures of the poses.

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We don't want to prime them
with a concept of power.

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We want them to be feeling power.

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So two minutes they do this.

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We then ask them, "How powerful
do you feel?" on a series of items,

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and then we give them
an opportunity to gamble,

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and then we take another saliva sample.

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That's it. That's the whole experiment.

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So this is what we find.
Risk tolerance, which is the gambling,

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we find that when you are
in the high-power pose condition,

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86 percent of you will gamble.

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When you're in the
low-power pose condition,

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only 60 percent, and that's
a whopping significant difference.

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Here's what we find on testosterone.

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From their baseline when they come in,

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high-power people experience
about a 20-percent increase,

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and low-power people experience
about a 10-percent decrease.

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So again, two minutes,
and you get these changes.

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Here's what you get on cortisol.

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High-power people experience
about a 25-percent decrease,

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and the low-power people experience
about a 15-percent increase.

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So two minutes lead to these hormonal
changes that configure your brain

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to basically be either assertive,
confident and comfortable,

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or really stress-reactive,
and feeling sort of shut down.

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And we've all had the feeling, right?

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So it seems that our nonverbals do govern
how we think and feel about ourselves,

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so it's not just others,
but it's also ourselves.

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Also, our bodies change our minds.

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But the next question, of course,
is, can power posing for a few minutes

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really change your life
in meaningful ways?

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This is in the lab, it's this little
task, it's just a couple of minutes.

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Where can you actually apply this?

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Which we cared about, of course.

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And so we think where you want
to use this is evaluative situations,

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like social threat situations.

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Where are you being evaluated,
either by your friends?

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For teenagers,
it's at the lunchroom table.

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For some people it's speaking
at a school board meeting.

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It might be giving a pitch or giving
a talk like this or doing a job interview.

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We decided that the one
that most people could relate to

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because most people had been
through, was the job interview.

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So we published these findings,
and the media are all over it,

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and they say, Okay, so this is what you do

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when you go in for the
job interview, right?

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(Laughter) You know, so we were
of course horrified, and said,

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Oh my God, no, that's
not what we meant at all.

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For numerous reasons, no, don't do that.

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Again, this is not about
you talking to other people.

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It's you talking to yourself.

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What do you do before you go
into a job interview? You do this.

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You're sitting down.
You're looking at your iPhone --

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or your Android,
not trying to leave anyone out.

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You're looking at your notes,
you're hunching up, making yourself small,

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when really what you should
be doing maybe is this,

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like, in the bathroom, right?
Do that. Find two minutes.

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So that's what we want to test. Okay?

00:14:05.530 --> 00:14:10.647
So we bring people into a lab, and they
do either high- or low-power poses again,

00:14:10.730 --> 00:14:13.277
they go through a very
stressful job interview.

00:14:13.360 --> 00:14:16.887
It's five minutes long.
They are being recorded.

00:14:16.970 --> 00:14:23.377
They're being judged also, and the judges
are trained to give no nonverbal feedback,

00:14:23.460 --> 00:14:27.267
so they look like this. Imagine
this is the person interviewing you.

00:14:27.350 --> 00:14:31.887
So for five minutes, nothing,
and this is worse than being heckled.

00:14:31.970 --> 00:14:33.557
People hate this.

00:14:33.640 --> 00:14:37.297
It's what Marianne LaFrance calls
"standing in social quicksand."

00:14:37.380 --> 00:14:39.107
So this really spikes your cortisol.

00:14:39.190 --> 00:14:41.417
So this is the job interview
we put them through,

00:14:41.500 --> 00:14:43.637
because we really wanted
to see what happened.

00:14:43.720 --> 00:14:46.737
We then have these coders look
at these tapes, four of them.

00:14:46.820 --> 00:14:49.917
They're blind to the hypothesis.
They're blind to the conditions.

00:14:50.000 --> 00:14:52.697
They have no idea who's
been posing in what pose,

00:14:52.780 --> 00:14:57.787
and they end up looking
at these sets of tapes,

00:14:57.870 --> 00:15:01.487
and they say, "We want to hire these
people," all the high-power posers.

00:15:01.570 --> 00:15:03.287
"We don't want to hire these people.

00:15:03.370 --> 00:15:07.127
We also evaluate these people
much more positively overall."

00:15:07.210 --> 00:15:10.807
But what's driving it? It's not
about the content of the speech.

00:15:10.890 --> 00:15:13.677
It's about the presence that
they're bringing to the speech.

00:15:13.760 --> 00:15:16.177
Because we rate them
on all these variables

00:15:16.260 --> 00:15:19.747
related to competence, like,
how well-structured is the speech?

00:15:19.830 --> 00:15:21.997
How good is it?
What are their qualifications?

00:15:22.080 --> 00:15:24.647
No effect on those things.
This is what's affected.

00:15:24.730 --> 00:15:28.787
These kinds of things. People are
bringing their true selves, basically.

00:15:28.870 --> 00:15:32.327
They're bringing themselves.
They bring their ideas, but as themselves,

00:15:32.410 --> 00:15:34.557
with no, you know, residue over them.

00:15:34.640 --> 00:15:39.497
So this is what's driving the effect,
or mediating the effect.

00:15:39.580 --> 00:15:42.857
So when I tell people about this,

00:15:42.940 --> 00:15:46.237
that our bodies change our minds
and our minds can change our behavior,

00:15:46.320 --> 00:15:50.587
and our behavior can change our outcomes,
they say to me, "It feels fake." Right?

00:15:50.670 --> 00:15:52.487
So I said, fake it till you make it.

00:15:52.570 --> 00:15:57.537
It's not me. I don't want to get
there and then still feel like a fraud.

00:15:57.620 --> 00:15:59.367
I don't want to feel like an impostor.

00:15:59.450 --> 00:16:03.467
I don't want to get there only to feel
like I'm not supposed to be here.

00:16:03.550 --> 00:16:05.657
And that really resonated with me,

00:16:05.740 --> 00:16:08.897
because I want to tell you a little
story about being an impostor

00:16:08.980 --> 00:16:11.127
and feeling like I'm
not supposed to be here.

00:16:11.210 --> 00:16:14.067
When I was 19,
I was in a really bad car accident.

00:16:14.150 --> 00:16:17.467
I was thrown out of a car,
rolled several times.

00:16:17.550 --> 00:16:22.337
I was thrown from the car.
And I woke up in a head injury rehab ward,

00:16:22.420 --> 00:16:24.567
and I had been withdrawn from college,

00:16:24.650 --> 00:16:30.287
and I learned that my IQ had
dropped by two standard deviations,

00:16:30.370 --> 00:16:35.747
which was very traumatic. I knew my IQ
because I had identified with being smart,

00:16:35.830 --> 00:16:37.757
and I had been called gifted as a child.

00:16:37.840 --> 00:16:40.957
So I'm taken out of college,
I keep trying to go back.

00:16:41.040 --> 00:16:43.177
They say, "You're not
going to finish college.

00:16:43.260 --> 00:16:45.757
Just, you know, there are
other things for you to do,

00:16:45.840 --> 00:16:47.777
but that's not going to work out for you."

00:16:47.860 --> 00:16:51.337
So I really struggled with this,
and I have to say,

00:16:51.420 --> 00:16:54.117
having your identity taken
from you, your core identity,

00:16:54.200 --> 00:16:57.637
and for me it was being smart,
having that taken from you,

00:16:57.720 --> 00:17:00.757
there's nothing that leaves you
feeling more powerless than that.

00:17:00.840 --> 00:17:04.447
So I felt entirely powerless.
I worked and worked, and I got lucky,

00:17:04.530 --> 00:17:06.317
and worked, and got lucky, and worked.

00:17:06.400 --> 00:17:08.567
Eventually I graduated from college.

00:17:08.650 --> 00:17:10.587
It took me four years
longer than my peers,

00:17:10.670 --> 00:17:14.937
and I convinced someone,
my angel advisor, Susan Fiske,

00:17:15.020 --> 00:17:17.877
to take me on, and so
I ended up at Princeton,

00:17:17.960 --> 00:17:20.727
and I was like,
I am not supposed to be here.

00:17:20.810 --> 00:17:23.947
I am an impostor.
And the night before my first-year talk,

00:17:24.030 --> 00:17:27.477
and the first-year talk at Princeton
is a 20-minute talk to 20 people.

00:17:27.560 --> 00:17:31.167
That's it. I was so afraid
of being found out the next day

00:17:31.250 --> 00:17:33.977
that I called her and said,
"I'm quitting."

00:17:34.060 --> 00:17:35.827
She was like, "You are not quitting,

00:17:35.910 --> 00:17:38.387
because I took a gamble
on you, and you're staying.

00:17:38.470 --> 00:17:41.177
You're going to stay,
and this is what you're going to do.

00:17:41.260 --> 00:17:42.537
You are going to fake it.

00:17:42.620 --> 00:17:45.717
You're going to do every talk
that you ever get asked to do.

00:17:45.800 --> 00:17:47.977
You're just going to do
it and do it and do it,

00:17:48.060 --> 00:17:50.427
even if you're terrified
and just paralyzed

00:17:50.510 --> 00:17:52.797
and having an out-of-body experience,

00:17:52.880 --> 00:17:56.167
until you have this moment where
you say, 'Oh my gosh, I'm doing it.

00:17:56.250 --> 00:17:59.137
Like, I have become this.
I am actually doing this.'"

00:17:59.220 --> 00:18:01.657
So that's what I did.
Five years in grad school,

00:18:01.740 --> 00:18:03.787
a few years, you know,
I'm at Northwestern,

00:18:03.870 --> 00:18:05.877
I moved to Harvard, I'm at Harvard,

00:18:05.960 --> 00:18:09.877
I'm not really thinking about it anymore,
but for a long time I had been thinking,

00:18:09.960 --> 00:18:14.397
"Not supposed to be here."
So at the end of my first year at Harvard,

00:18:14.480 --> 00:18:18.717
a student who had not talked
in class the entire semester,

00:18:18.800 --> 00:18:22.407
who I had said, "Look, you've gotta
participate or else you're going to fail,"

00:18:22.490 --> 00:18:24.957
came into my office.
I really didn't know her at all.

00:18:25.040 --> 00:18:31.620
She came in totally defeated, and she
said, "I'm not supposed to be here."

00:18:35.370 --> 00:18:37.267
And that was the moment for me.

00:18:37.350 --> 00:18:40.177
Because two things happened.
One was that I realized,

00:18:40.260 --> 00:18:43.317
oh my gosh, I don't
feel like that anymore.

00:18:43.400 --> 00:18:46.337
I don't feel that anymore,
but she does, and I get that feeling.

00:18:46.420 --> 00:18:48.627
And the second was,
she is supposed to be here!

00:18:48.710 --> 00:18:50.607
Like, she can fake it, she can become it.

00:18:50.690 --> 00:18:54.177
So I was like, "Yes, you are!
You are supposed to be here!

00:18:54.260 --> 00:18:55.967
And tomorrow you're going to fake it,

00:18:56.050 --> 00:18:58.677
you're going to make yourself
powerful, and, you know --

00:18:58.760 --> 00:19:04.087
(Applause)

00:19:04.170 --> 00:19:08.167
And you're going to go into the classroom,

00:19:08.250 --> 00:19:10.597
and you are going to give
the best comment ever."

00:19:10.680 --> 00:19:13.597
You know? And she gave
the best comment ever,

00:19:13.680 --> 00:19:15.557
and people turned around and were like,

00:19:15.640 --> 00:19:18.507
oh my God, I didn't even notice
her sitting there. (Laughter)

00:19:18.590 --> 00:19:20.327
She comes back to me months later,

00:19:20.410 --> 00:19:23.387
and I realized that she had not
just faked it till she made it,

00:19:23.470 --> 00:19:25.787
she had actually faked
it till she became it.

00:19:25.870 --> 00:19:31.697
So she had changed. And so I want to say
to you, don't fake it till you make it.

00:19:31.780 --> 00:19:34.487
Fake it till you become it.

00:19:34.570 --> 00:19:38.127
Do it enough until you actually
become it and internalize.

00:19:38.210 --> 00:19:40.787
The last thing I'm going
to leave you with is this.

00:19:40.870 --> 00:19:45.257
Tiny tweaks can lead to big changes.

00:19:45.340 --> 00:19:49.587
So, this is two minutes.
Two minutes, two minutes, two minutes.

00:19:49.670 --> 00:19:52.737
Before you go into the next
stressful evaluative situation,

00:19:52.820 --> 00:19:55.447
for two minutes,
try doing this, in the elevator,

00:19:55.530 --> 00:19:58.677
in a bathroom stall,
at your desk behind closed doors.

00:19:58.760 --> 00:20:02.947
That's what you want to do. Configure your
brain to cope the best in that situation.

00:20:03.030 --> 00:20:05.907
Get your testosterone up.
Get your cortisol down.

00:20:05.990 --> 00:20:09.877
Don't leave that situation feeling like,
oh, I didn't show them who I am.

00:20:09.960 --> 00:20:11.597
Leave that situation feeling like,

00:20:11.680 --> 00:20:14.597
I really feel like I got to say
who I am and show who I am.

00:20:14.680 --> 00:20:20.387
So I want to ask you first,
you know, both to try power posing,

00:20:20.470 --> 00:20:25.497
and also I want to ask you to share
the science, because this is simple.

00:20:25.580 --> 00:20:27.677
I don't have ego involved
in this. (Laughter)

00:20:27.760 --> 00:20:31.907
Give it away. Share it with people,
because the people who can use it the most

00:20:31.990 --> 00:20:37.477
are the ones with no resources and no
technology and no status and no power.

00:20:37.560 --> 00:20:40.047
Give it to them because
they can do it in private.

00:20:40.130 --> 00:20:42.517
They need their bodies,
privacy and two minutes,

00:20:42.600 --> 00:20:45.667
and it can significantly change
the outcomes of their life.

00:20:45.750 --> 00:20:49.940
Thank you. (Applause)