Love Signals: A Practical Field Guide To The Body Language Of Courtship - Hardcover

We now know more about how the brain processes nonverbal cues.

The Nonverbal Language of Love

Our unspoken language of love is universal. The postures, gestures, and facial cues of attraction are everywhere the same, in all societies and cultures. A case in point is the en face gaze. En face is an intimate form of eye-to-eye contact between mothers and newborns. An affectionate mother moves her face to within inches of her baby’s face and positions her eyes in parallel alignment with her baby’s eyes for optimal eye contact. Her en face gaze completely captivates the newborn, stops its crying, and nurtures a strong mother-child bond. Pediatricians view en face communication as a sort of “mating dance.” Mother and child gaze in seeming rapture, synchronize their body movements, and imitate each other’s facial expressions to enhance compatibility and build rapport.

En face is a worldwide courting ritual as well. Affectionate couples move their faces within inches of each other’s face, lock eyes, and gaze deeply to show their love. Figuratively, they become each other’s baby. A potent love signal, en face is as romantic and compelling in Alabama as it is in Zululand.

Since the body language of courtship is universal, you needn’t speak the native tongue to attract a mate. One of the most exotic courtships I know of, between a tall, white, middle-aged New Jersey man and a short, teenage, African Pygmy, took place entirely apart from speaking. Before their engagement, neither she nor he uttered a mutually intelligible word. Gestures accomplished what conversation could not.

If the language of love is universal, you might wonder why we need a field guide to decipher its cues. One reason is that people postpone marriage in favor of careers today. As a result, they have problems attracting partners who are older, wiser, busier—and choosier. Thirty-somethings are less automatically smitten than they were as youths in high school. Another reason is that divorced men and women feel out of practice. They have trouble decoding the love signals they received earlier in their teens and twenties. Many, who avoided flirting after marriage, find it hard to shift gears and flirt again. In large metropolitan areas like Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York, thousands of eligible partners await the attention of complete strangers. In the past—in rural areas—people were more likely to court familiar folk who were known to be “safe.” Unacquainted couples often had matchmakers to ease them through the psychological barrier of stranger anxiety.

The dating scene is different today. Urban singles find themselves surrounded by strangers. Some use video dating services, go on cruises, run personal ads in newspapers, or search the Internet. Many find that interacting with people who are unfamiliar can be uncomfortable, unpredictable, even unsafe. Is that woman sincere? Is she telling the truth? Can I trust this man? Is he genuine? Is he dangerous? What clues should I look for?

Answers to these questions lie not in words, which can be deceptively manipulated, but in more candid, unedited signs from our faces, bodies, and hands. Silent messages emitted from shoulder shrugs, eyeblinks, aftershaves, eyebrows, tattoos, and toe cleavage fill the nonverbal landscape Love Signals explores. Used as a field guide to the natural history of courtship, Love Signals shows how to read beneath and between a partner’s spoken lines.

As you will see, the body’s unspoken script reveals volumes about hidden agendas, feelings, and fears. Estimates of what percentage of our total communication is nonverbal range from 60 to 93 percent. In courtship, the percentage of emotional communication that is nonverbal exceeds 99 percent. When it comes to emotions, instead of verbalizing how we feel, our bodies do the talking.

What Do Hands Say?

A case in point is hands, which attract special notice in courtship. We find fingers, palms, and wrists incredibly appealing to look at. Dedicated centers in our temporal lobes, the cerebral lobes located just above our ears on either side of the brain, respond exclusively to hand shapes (Kandel, 1991). Both men and women are unconsciously alert to the physical appearance of each other’s hands and digits as well as to their expressive shapes and gestures.