Improve your posture to improve your emotions
By Bibiana Badenes
According to Amy Cuddy, a social psychologist at Harvard University (USA), body language shapes our identity. Cuddy has helped spread the word about the role posture plays in mood.
If we know that the mind can induce changes in the body, Could the body also change the mind? I mean thoughts, feelings and the physiological components that shape them, such as hormones.
A posture of power improves mood
The gestures of power they imply a wide occupation of space, a clear sign of the absence of fear. On the contrary, the posture of being collapsed implies shrinking, insecurity, sadness and even fear. It is something that we have all experienced or lived through, and confirmed by studies.
Amy Cuddy tells us that humans, like all other animals, express power with their body postures. They turn in on themselves when they feel insecure, making themselves smaller, slouching, crossing their arms over their chests, and reducing their movements. On the contrary, when they feel strong they expand and take up more space.
Cuddy and her collaborator Dana Carney – this one from the University of Berkeley (USA) – wondered if adopting these positions could change the internal state of a person and make her feel more powerful.
More testosterone, less cortisol
In order to find out, Cuddy and Carney conducted an experiment involving testosterone and cortisol. Testosterone is the hormone of power – at high levels it creates a feeling of security – while cortisol is the hormone associated with stress.
We know that people with leadership They are usually characterized by a high level of testosterone and a low level of cortisol.
In the experiment, people were asked to adopt either a power pose or a low power pose for two minutes.
They were then asked if they wanted to bet. 86% of those who had adopted the position of power, chose to bet, while only 60% of those who had maintained the position of low power chose to do so, with a significant difference of 26% between one group and another.
But they not only found out this information during the investigation, they drew even more interesting conclusions. they discovered physiological differences between the two study groups, based on saliva samples.
While those in the power pose showed an 8% increase in their testosterone levelsin the group that experienced the low power pose there was a 10% decrease in this hormone.
The reverse reaction occurred with cortisol, stress hormone. People who held the power pose experienced a 25% reduction in their cortisol levels, while those who held the low power pose had a 15% increase in their stress levels.
Posture conditions thoughts
Other studies, such as those of Professor Erik Peper, from the University of San Francisco (USA), show that, in a upright positionit is easier for us to choose our positive personal traits, whereas when we are hunched over what comes to mind are negative ideas, and the researcher concludes that our body posture ends up influencing our self-confidence.
Hunched over, more depression? Peper and his team believe that posture also contributes to being low energy and with depression.
Maybe we should consider that the time we spend hunched over and sitting at the computer or looking at the phone can influence the increase in depression of the last years.