Nonverbal Communication

Nonverbal Communication is a term of social psychology. Nonverbal elements of communication are as follows:

• Tone of voice (intonation)
• Expression of the eyes
• Body position (posturology)
• Touches and body contact (haptics)
• Gestures - movements of the head, hands (dependent on the culture)
• Touches (haptics)
• Facial expression (mimic)
• The movements of the body - arms, legs, torso - (kinesics)
• Distance and establishing its position in space in an area (proxemics)
• The physical aspects of appearance (hairstyle, clothing)

What is our non-verbal communication for?

Good “reading” and use of nonverbal communication enables efficient communication and better understanding of the often hidden motives of partner or partners in communication.

Generally a large part of the message in human communication is being transmitted nonverbally, through those non-verbal forms. Most of the described components are culturally and situationally dependent and therefore not easy to interpret - with the exception of facial expressions - see FACS (Facial Action Coding System) and the Six Basic Emotions. Using non-verbal communication sometimes we replace and sometimes we support or emphasize our verbal communication. It is a human nature that by nonverbal communication we express emotions.

During normal communication, where the emphasis is on communicating facts or logical information is a nonverbal communication around 30% while when we expressing emotional content it can be up to 90% of the message.