1 | ARTICLE (Note that many present multiple studies) | ABSTRACT | IS THERE SUPPORT FOR THE CENTRAL POSTURAL FEEDBACK HYPOTHESES? | ||
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2 | 1 | Allen, J., Gervais, S. J., & Smith, J. L. (2013). Sit Big to Eat Big: The Interaction of Body Posture and Body Concern on Restrained Eating. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 37(3), 325–336. | Body image concern has long been linked with unhealthy restrained eating patterns among women, yet scant research has examined factors to disrupt this process. At the same time, feminine stereotypes prescribe that women should be small, restrict their movements, speak softly, and limit their food intake (e.g., through dieting). Here, we examined whether women’s postural constriction or expansion moderated the relation between body shape concern and restrained eating, predicting that expansive postures would interrupt this robust relation. As a secondary aim, we investigated whether women spontaneously adopted constrictive postures and to what extent postures contributed to restrained eating under baseline conditions. Specifically, women’s postural position (constricted, expanded, or baseline posture) was manipulated and restrained eating was measured. Results showed that at high levels of body shape concern, women sitting in expansive postures restrained their eating less compared to women in constrictive postures. Further, spontaneously expansive (vs. spontaneously constrictive) postures were associated with less restrained eating among women. Thus, postural expansion attenuated the link between body shape concern and restrained eating whereas postural constriction exacerbated the link. Implications for gender per- formativity and possible interventions for restrained eating are discussed. | YES | |
3 | 2 | Arnette, S. L., & Ii, T. F. P. (2012). The effects of posture on self-perceived leadership. International Journal of Business and Social Science, 3(14). | Humans express and perceive the moods and thoughts of others through the posture that they exhibit. But can the postures individuals maintain determine their own leadership perceptions? The results of this study confirmed the prediction that posing in a positive, upright posture lead individuals to rate themselves higher in leadership than posing in a negative, slouched posture. Participants (N = 42) who posed in the positive posture consistently chose seats closer to the head of the table on a chair circling task while participants in the negative posture condition chose seats further from the head of the table, indicative of a lesser sense of leadership. These findings suggest that embodiment extends into cognitive processing; effecting the thoughts and feelings an individual has concerning his or her leadership. Maintaining an upright position may bolster individual leadership perceptions before important interviews, meetings, tasks, and decisions. | YES | |
4 | 3 | Bailey, April H., Marianne LaFrance, and John F. Dovidio. Could a Woman Be Superman? Gender and the Embodiment of Power Postures. Comprehensive Results in Social Psychology, 2, 6–27. doi:10.1080/23743603.2016.1248079. | Physical postures can instill a sense of power in the self as well as communicate power to others. Recent work indicates that a target’s gender interferes with the rapid identification of power postures; men in low-power postures and women in high-power postures slow viewers’ identification. We hypothesized that how long people enact low and high-power postures will vary as a function of their own gender and the gender of the person modeling the posture. We presented male and female participants with images of male and female models in low and high-power postures and asked them to enact the postures for an unspecific duration. We measured enacted duration, risky behavior, and felt power. The preregistered hypothesis that posture condition and participant gender would interact was not supported. Instead, overall, participants enacted the high-power postures longer than the low-power posture. Supporting the preregistered hypothesis that target gender would interact with posture condition and participant gender, only male participants’ time in the postures was sensitive to posture and model gender combinations. Consistent with theories proposing greater rigidity of male gender roles, male participants enacted the low-power postures for the least amount of time when duplicating a female model in a low-power posture. Finally, we did not strongly replicate prior work, but found some support that enacting high-power postures led to riskier behavior and more felt power for some aspects of the sample in exploratory analyses. | MIXED | |
5 | 4 | Bohns, V. K., & Wiltermuth, S. S. (2012). It hurts when I do this (or you do that): Posture and pain tolerance. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 48(1), 341–345. [2 studies] | Recent research (Carney, Cuddy, & Yap, 2010) has shown that adopting a powerful pose changes people's hormonal levels and increases their propensity to take risks in the same ways that possessing actual power does. In the current research, we explore whether adopting physical postures associated with power, or simply interacting with others who adopt these postures, can similarly influence sensitivity to pain. We conducted two experiments. In Experiment 1, participants who adopted dominant poses displayed higher pain thresholds than those who adopted submissive or neutral poses. These findings were not explained by semantic priming. In Experiment 2, we manipulated power poses via an interpersonal interaction and found that power posing engendered a complementary (Tiedens & Fragale, 2003) embodied power experience in interaction partners. Participants who interacted with a submissive confederate displayed higher pain thresholds and greater handgrip strength than participants who interacted with a dominant confederate. | YES | |
6 | 5 | Bombari, Dario, Marianne Schmid Mast, and Caroline Pulfrey. Real and Imagined Power Poses: Is the Physical Experience Necessary after All? Comprehensive Results in Social Psychology, 2, 44–54. doi:10.1080/23743603.2017.1341183. | Previous research investigated the effects of power poses at the behavioral, subjective, and neuroendocrine level. However, it is not clear whether the same effects would be obtained also by just imagining, rather than adopting, a power pose. We planned to investigate this question by asking 200 participants to either perform or imagine a constrictive or an expansive body posture during 2 min and then measure the effect on a gambling decision task and on felt power. We followed a sequential analysis procedure by running the first 100 participants in the performed posture condition in order to check the presence of the power posing effect. Because no effect of power poses on gambling decision or on felt power was found, we ran the remaining 100 participants also in the performed instead of the imagined condition. The results after running 200 participants confirmed that power poses did not affect gambling decision. However, participants felt more powerful after adopting an expansive pose compared to a constrictive pose. Exploratory analyses found that this effect was mainly driven by male participants. In addition, participants rated themselves as being more able to adopt the expansive body posture and they reported to put more effort in adopting the restrictive body posture. Overall, our results indicate that the effect of power poses on behavior might not be as widespread as previously thought of and suggest that moderators should be investigated carefully in future research. | MIXED | |
7 | 6 | Bos, M. W., & Cuddy, A. J. C. (working paper). iPosture: The Size of Electronic Consumer Devices Affects our Behavior. | We examined whether incidental body posture, prompted by working on electronic devices of different sizes, affects power-related behaviors. Grounded in research showing that adopting expansive body postures increases psychological power, we hypothesized that working on larger devices, which forces people to physically expand, causes users to behave more assertively. Participants were randomly assigned to interact with one of four electronic devices that varied in size: an iPod Touch, an iPad, a MacBook Pro (laptop computer), or an iMac (desktop computer). As hypothesized, compared to participants working on larger devices (e.g., an iMac), participants who worked on smaller devices (e.g., an iPad) behaved less assertively – waiting longer to interrupt an experimenter who had made them wait, or not interrupting at all. | YES | |
8 | 7 | Briñol, P., Petty, R. E., & Wagner, B. (2009). Body posture effects on self‐evaluation: A self‐validation approach. European Journal of Social Psychology, 39(6), 1053-1064. | Building on the notion of embodied attitudes, we examined how body postures can influence self-evaluations by affecting thought confidence, a meta-cognitive process. Specifically, participants were asked to think about and write down their best or worse qualities while they were sitting down with their back erect and pushing their chest out (confident posture) or slouched forward with their back curved (doubtful posture). Then, participants completed a number of measures and reported their self-evaluations. In line with the self-validation hypothesis, we predicted and found that the effect of the direction of thoughts (positive/negative) on self-related attitudes was significantly greater when participants wrote their thoughts in the confident than in the doubtful posture. These postures did not influence the number or quality of thoughts listed, but did have an impact on the confidence with which people held their thoughts. | YES | |
9 | 8 | Carney, D. R., Cuddy, A. J., & Yap, A. J. (2010). Power posing brief nonverbal displays affect neuroendocrine levels and risk tolerance. Psychological Science, 21(10), 1363-1368. [2 studies] | Humans and other animals express power through open, expansive postures, and they express powerlessness through closed, contractive postures. But can these postures actually cause power? The results of this study confirmed our prediction that posing in high-power nonverbal displays (as opposed to low-power nonverbal displays) would cause neuroendocrine and behavioral changes for both male and female participants: High-power posers experienced elevations in testosterone, decreases in cortisol, and increased feelings of power and tolerance for risk; low-power posers exhibited the opposite pattern. In short, posing in displays of power caused advantaged and adaptive psychological, physiological, and behavioral changes, and these findings suggest that embodiment extends beyond mere thinking and feeling, to physiology and subsequent behavioral choices. That a person can, by assuming two simple 1-min poses, embody power and instantly become more powerful has real-world, actionable implications. | YES | |
10 | 9 | Cesario, J., & McDonald, M. M. (2013). Bodies in context: Power poses as a computation of action possibility. Social Cognition, 31(2), 260. [2 studies] | One perspective on embodiment proposes that bodily states exert direct, context-free effects on psychological states, as in the research on “power poses.” We propose instead that bodily states in uence psychology by providing information about what actions are possible. If such an assessment is to be effective, however, it must consider the body as it exists in context, as context provides essential information in de ning action possibility. In Study 1, expansive and constrictive poses in uenced power only when held in an interpersonal context, which provides action-relevant meaning to these poses as dominance and submissiveness. In Study 2, poses had no effect on power when roles provided more important information about potential action (e.g., being frisked by police while holding an expansive pose resulted in less powerful behavior). If the function of cognition is to prepare the body for effective action, then cognitive processes cannot be insensitive to the current context. | YES | |
11 | 10 | Ceunen, E., Zaman, J., Vlaeyen, J. W. S., Dankaerts, W., & Van Diest, I. (2014). Effect of Seated Trunk Posture on Eye Blink Startle and Subjective Experience: Comparing Flexion, Neutral Upright Posture, and Extension of Spine. PLoS ONE, 9(2), e88482. | Postures are known to be able to affect emotion and motivation. Much less is known about whether (affective) modulation of eye blink startle occurs following specific postures. The objective of the current study was to explore this. Participants in the present study were requested to assume three different sitting postures: with the spine flexed (slouched), neutral upright, and extended. Each posture was assumed for four minutes, and was followed by the administration of brief self- report questionnaires before proceeding to the next posture. The same series of postures and measures were repeated prior to ending the experiment. Results indicate that, relative to the other postures, the extended sitting posture was associated with an increased startle, was more unpleasant, arousing, had smaller levels of dominance, induced more discomfort, and was perceived as more difficult. The upright and flexed sitting postures differed in the level of self-reported positive affect, but not in eye blink startle amplitudes. | YES | |
12 | 11 | Cuddy, A. J. C., Wilmuth, C. A., Yap, A. J., & Carney, D. R. (2015). Preparatory power posing affects nonverbal presence and job interview performance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 100(4), 1286–1295. | The authors tested whether engaging in expansive (vs. contractive) “power poses” before a stressful job interview—preparatory power posing—would enhance performance during the interview. Participants ad- opted high-power (i.e., expansive, open) poses or low-power (i.e., contractive, closed) poses, and then prepared and delivered a speech to 2 evaluators as part of a mock job interview. All interview speeches were videotaped and coded for overall performance and hireability and for 2 potential mediators: verbal content (e.g., structure, content) and nonverbal presence (e.g., captivating, enthusiastic). As predicted, those who prepared for the job interview with high- (vs. low-) power poses performed better and were more likely to be chosen for hire; this relation was mediated by nonverbal presence, but not by verbal content. Although previous research has focused on how a nonverbal behavior that is enacted during interactions and observed by perceivers affects how those perceivers evaluate and respond to the actor, this experiment focused on how a nonverbal behavior that is enacted before the interaction and unobserved by perceivers affects the actor’s performance, which, in turn, affects how perceivers evaluate and respond to the actor. This experiment reveals a theoretically novel and practically informative result that demonstrates the causal relation between prepa- ratory nonverbal behavior and subsequent performance and outcomes. | YES | |
13 | 12 | Duffy, S. E., & Feist, M. I. (2016). Power in time: The influence of power posing on metaphoric perspectives on time. Language and Cognition, 1–11. | In English, the Moving Ego metaphor conceptualizes the ego as moving forward through time and the Moving Time metaphor construes time as moving forward toward the ego. Recent research has provided evidence that people’s metaphorical perspectives on deictic time may be influenced by experiences—both spatial and non-spatial—that are connected to approach motivations (Moving Ego) and avoidance motivations (Moving Time). We extend this research further, asking whether there are differences in preferred temporal perspective between those who exhibit higher and lower degrees of power, as high power has been connected to approach motivations and low power, to avoidance motivations. Across two temporal tasks, participants in our study who adopted high-power poses demonstrated a greater preference for the Moving Ego perspective, compared to those adopting low-power poses. These results suggest an embodied connection between approach and avoidance motivations and the Moving Ego and Moving Time metaphors, respectively. | YES | |
14 | 13 | Fischer, J., Fischer, P., Englich, B., Aydin, N., & Frey, D. (2011). Empower my decisions: The effects of power gestures on confirmatory information processing. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 47(6), 1146–1154. | Recent research has shown that social power systematically influences information processing in many ways, and can be induced simply via powerful gestures or postures. The current studies investigated the impact of embodied power on confirmatory information processing after decision making. Based upon previous social power research, we hypothesized that individuals who posed in powerful ways (making a clenched fist or sitting in an open, expansive posture) would systematically prefer decision-consistent over decision-inconsistent information; an effect known as selective exposure, or biased assimilation. Four studies consistently indicated that bodily positioning associated with high levels of power induced greater confirmatory tendencies in the evaluation and search stages of a subsequent, decision-relevant information task (Studies 1–4). This tendency is unlikely to be due to mere physical strain (Study 4), and was mediated by differences in experienced decision certainty (Studies 3 and 4); indicating that the embodiment of high power makes people more confident regarding the validity of their decisions. Consequently, high-power posers systematically prefer information that is consistent with their decision preference. | YES | |
15 | 14 | Fuller, R. C., & Montgomery, D. E. (2015). Body Posture and Religious Attitudes. Archive for the Psychology of Religion, 37(3), 227–239. | One hundred and twenty-seven college students were recruited for an experimental investigation of the effect of body posture on religious attitudes. Roughly half of the participants were placed in lower, contractive body postures while the other half were placed in higher, expansive body postures. After five minutes in these postures, all were asked to fill out a measure of religious attitudes. As expected, participants in the lower, contractive positions expressed more agreement with conventional religious beliefs than those in the higher, expansive positions. | YES | |
16 | 15 | Garrison, K. E., Tang, D., & Schmeichel, B. J. (2016). Embodying Power: A Preregistered Replication and Extension of the Power Pose Effect. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 7(7), 623-630. | Adopting expansive (vs. contractive) body postures may influence psychological states associated with power. The current experiment sought to replicate and extend research on the power pose effect by adding another manipulation that embodies power—eye gaze. Participants (N 1⁄4 305) adopted expansive (high power) or contractive (low power) poses while gazing ahead (i.e., dominantly) or down at the ground (i.e., submissively). Afterward, participants played a hypothetical ultimatum game, made a gambling decision, and reported how powerful and in charge they felt. Neither body posture nor eye gaze influenced the gambling decision, and contrary to the predictions, adopting an expansive pose reduced feelings of power. We also found that holding a direct gaze increased the probability of rejecting a low offer on the ultimatum game. We consider why power posing did not have the predicted effects. | MIXED | |
17 | 16 | Gronau, Quentin F., Sara Van Erp, Daniel W. Heck, Joseph Cesario, Kai J. Jonas, and Eric-Jan Wagenmakers. A Bayesian Model-Averaged Meta-Analysis of the Power Pose Effect with Informed and Default Priors: The Case of Felt Power. Comprehensive Results in Social Psychology 2 (1). | Earlier work found that – compared to participants who adopted constrictive body postures – participants who adopted expansive body postures reported feeling more powerful, showed an increase in testosterone and a decrease in cortisol, and displayed an increased tolerance for risk. However, these power pose effects have recently come under considerable scrutiny. Here, we present a Bayesian meta-analysis of six preregistered studies from this special issue, focusing on the effect of power posing on felt power. Our analysis improves on standard classical meta-analyses in several ways. First and foremost, we considered only preregistered studies, eliminating concerns about publication bias. Second, the Bayesian approach enables us to quantify evidence for both the alternative and the null hypothesis. Third, we use Bayesian model-averaging to account for the uncertainty with respect to the choice for a fixed-effect model or a random-effect model. Fourth, based on a literature review, we obtained an empirically informed prior distribution for the between-study heterogeneity of effect sizes. This empirically informed prior can serve as a default choice not only for the investigation of the power pose effect but for effects in the field of psychology more generally. For effect size, we considered a default and an informed prior. Our meta-analysis yields very strong evidence for an effect of power posing on felt power. However, when the analysis is restricted to participants unfamiliar with the effect, the meta-analysis yields evidence that is only moderate. | YES | |
18 | 17 | Hao, N., Xue, H., Yuan, H., Wang, Q., & Runco, M. A. (2017). Enhancing creativity: Proper body posture meets proper emotion. Acta Psychologica, 173, 32–40. [2 studies] | This study tested whether compatibility or incompatibility between body posture and emotion was beneficial for creativity. In Study 1, participants were asked to solve the Alternative Uses Task (AUT) problems when performing open or closed body posture in positive or negative emotional state respectively. The results showed that originality of AUT performance was higher in the compatible conditions (i.e., open-positive and closed-negative) than in the incompatible conditions (i.e., closed-positive and open-negative). In Study 2, the compatibility effect was replicated in both the AUT and the Realistic Presented Problem test (i.e., RPP). Moreover, it was revealed that participants exhibited the highest associative flexibility in the open-positive condition, and the highest persistence in the closed-negative condition. These findings indicate that compatibility between body posture and emotion is beneficial for creativity. This may be because when the implicit emotions elicited by body posture match explicit emotions, the effects of emotions on creativity are enhanced, therefore promoting creativity through the flexibility or the persistence pathway respectively. | YES | |
19 | 18 | Huang, L., Galinsky, A. D., Gruenfeld, D. H., & Guillory, L. E. (2011). Powerful Postures Versus Powerful Roles: Which Is the Proximate Correlate of Thought and Behavior? Psychological Science, 22(1), 95–102. [3 studies] | Three experiments explored whether hierarchical role and body posture have independent or interactive effects on the main outcomes associated with power: action in behavior and abstraction in thought. Although past research has found that being in a powerful role and adopting an expansive body posture can each enhance a sense of power, two experiments showed that when individuals were placed in highor low-power roles while adopting an expansive or constricted posture, only posture affected the implicit activation of power, the taking of action, and abstraction. However, even though role had a smaller effect on the downstream consequences of power, it had a stronger effect than posture on self-reported sense of power. A final experiment found that posture also had a larger effect on action than recalling an experience of high or low power. We discuss body postures as one of the most proximate correlates of the manifestations of power. | YES | |
20 | 19 | Jackson, Benita, Kelly Nault, Laura Smart Richman, Onawa LaBelle, and Nicolas Rohleder. “Does That Pose Become You? Testing the Effect of Body Postures on Self-Concept.” Comprehensive Results in Social Psychology 2, no. 1 (January 2, 2017): 81–105. doi:10.1080/23743603.2017.1341178. | Self-concept expansion predicts a range of adaptive outcomes. An intriguing possible cause of self-concept expansion is the posing of one’s body expansively, that is, “power posing.” In Study 1 (N = 65), we found that body expansion had an effect, of moderate magnitude (d = 0.58), on self-concept size in college women as measured by the Twenty Statements Test. Participants who were randomly assigned to hold expanded poses (vs. contracted) – under the guise of a cover story about holding different body positions to test the accuracy of wireless electrodes – wrote significantly more self-statements than those who assumed contracted positions. In pre-registered Study 2 we tested whether this finding was replicable and extended this research by aiming to characterize the process by which it occurred. One hundred and twenty-eight women students were randomly assigned to hold either expanded or contracted postures. They completed surveys measuring two general classes of potential mediators (“broaden-and-build” and “narrow-and-disrupt”), body self-objectification as a moderator, and four indices of self-concept size. Posture was not found to affect self-concept size, nor was it moderated by self-objectification. Though there was no effect on self-expansion, in exploratory analyses, assigned posture affected one of the broaden-and-build measures: psychological flexibility. Results of Study 2 could indicate that a mere two minutes of holding an expanded versus contracted body posture is not enough to induce changes in self-concept size; lack of main effects could in addition be due to a range of unmeasured confounders and/or the fragile and transient nature of the effect. | MIXED | |
21 | 20 | Keller, Victor N., David J. Johnson, and Jenna A. Harder. Meeting Your Inner Super(wo)man: Are Power Poses Effective When Taught? Comprehensive Results in Social Psychology 2, no. 1 (January 2, 2017): 106–22. doi:10.1080/23743603.2017.1341186. | Researchers have argued that power poses are an effective way for individuals to empower themselves to achieve personal goals. However, in laboratory studies, individuals are often unaware of the function of the poses; in real-world settings, participants must know the function of the pose in order to deliberately use it. We tested whether power poses are effective when an individual knows their consequences by directly manipulating awareness of the function of power poses. We found no evidence for the overall effect of power poses or an interaction with awareness on both traditional measures of power and a more ecologically valid assessment. Our results suggest the benefits of using power poses outside laboratory settings are limited. | NO | |
22 | 21 | Klaschinski, Lukas, Konrad Schnabel, and Michela Schröder-Abé. “Benefits of Power Posing: Effects on Dominance and Social Sensitivity.” Comprehensive Results in Social Psychology 2, 55–67. doi:10.1080/23743603.2016.1248080. | The current study attempted to replicate results by Cuddy, Wilmuth, Yap, and Carney (2015) who showed that adopting high-power poses prior to a demanding job interview improved dominant behavior and overall hireability judgments. We extended this approach by adding social sensitivity as a second important dimension of social competences. We tested the following hypotheses: (1) Power posing increases behavioral dominance indicators (2) Power posing strengthens behavioral indicators of social sensitivity. We also attempted to replicate results by Cuddy and colleagues who demonstrated that the effects of the power-posing manipulation on hireability judgments were mediated by behavioral dominance indicators. Additionally, we hypothesized that hireability judgments are independently predicted by indicators of dominance and social sensitivity. Results failed to replicate the findings by Cuddy and colleagues (2015). Power posing had no significant main effects on behavioral indicators of dominance and social sensitivity. As expected, hireability judgments were independently predicted by dominance and social sensitivity. | MIXED | |
23 | 22 | Kozak, M. N., Roberts, T.-A., & Patterson, K. E. (2014). She stoops to conquer? How posture interacts with self-objectification and status to impact women’s affect and performance. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 38(3), 414–424. | Research suggests that posture exerts powerful affective and cognitive influences, although recent studies have indicated that these embodiment effects are moderated by gender. We examined two sociocultural factors that may contribute to the effects of postural feedback in women: self-objectification and power. Across a 2 2 2 between-subjects design, 80 female under- graduates completed various cognitive tasks and self-report measures after having been in an upright or slouched posture, seated in either a (powerful) throne or child’s chair, and wearing either a formfitting (objectifying) tank top or loose sweatshirt. The results showed that posture had the predicted influence on mood, with those seated upright reporting more positive mood than those seated in a slouched position. For the cognitive tasks, our findings were more complex and, due to low power, are best considered preliminary. Participants who were seated upright in a child’s chair while wearing a sweatshirt attempted the highest number of math items compared to those in the other conditions, supporting our prediction that postural benefits would be greatest in a context where power cues were gender-appropriate and self-objectification effects were attenuated. On a measure of satisfaction with performance, our findings suggest that self-objectification outweighed the power manipulation, leading to poorer outcomes when a seated position emphasized sexualized features of the body. Taken together, our results suggest that embodiment effects appear to be impacted by contextual cues, perhaps particularly for women. | YES | |
24 | 23 | Kwon, J., & Kim, S. Y. (2015). The Effect of Posture on Stress and Self-Esteem: Comparing Contractive and Neutral Postures (No. 2705176). International Institute of Social and Economic Sciences. | A study on the effect of contractive posture was conducted in a laboratory setting. Following the previous literature on posture studies, this study examined the negative effects of contractive posture on task performance and confidence. This study modified the methodological errors made in previous studies by comparing the contractive posture effect to the neutral posture effect, rather than the power posture effect. The results revealed that contractive posture has negative effects on self-challenging behavior creativity, and immediate stress, specifically by inducing self-depreciative thoughts. On the other hand, posture was not found to affect relatively stable characteristics such as intelligence level, self-esteem, and life-satisfaction scores. | YES | |
25 | 24 | Latu, Ioana M., Sean Duffy, Vaani Pardal, and Madeliene Alger. Power vs. Persuasion: Can Open Body Postures Embody Openness to Persuasion? Comprehensive Results in Social Psychology 2, no. 1 (January 2, 2017): 68–80. doi:10.1080/23743603.2017.1327178. | In the current study, we sought to replicate the finding that adopting an open/expansive body posture increases subjective feelings of power, while also investigating how these body postures influence the processing of persuasive messages. Two hundred participants were randomly assigned to adopt either an open or a closed body posture while reading either a strong or a weak persuasive message regarding junk food taxation. Afterwards, we measured participants’ attitudes toward junk food, subjective feelings of power, thought confidence, and openness. Results failed to replicate the previously found effect of body posture on subjective feelings of power. Compared to weak messages, strong messages led to more persuasion, higher subjective power, more thought confidence, and more openness. However, body posture did not affect these outcomes. Overall, these findings challenge the idea of a direct, causal relationship between open body postures and power, by showing that power posing effects are not maintained under certain conditions. | NO | |
26 | 25 | Lee, E. H., & Schnall, S. (2014). The influence of social power on weight perception. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 143(4), 1719–1725. | Three studies explored whether social power affects the perception of physical properties of objects, testing the hypothesis that the powerless find objects to be heavier than the powerful do. Correlational findings from Study 1 revealed that people with a low personal sense of power perceived loaded boxes to be heavier than people with a high personal sense of power perceived them to be. In Study 2, experimentally manipulated power indicated that participants in the powerless condition judged the boxes to be heavier than did participants in the powerful condition. Study 3 further indicated that lacking power actively influences weight perception relative to a neutral control condition, whereas having power does not. Although much research on embodied perception has shown that various physiological and psychosocial resources influence visual perception of the physical environment, this is the first demonstration suggesting that power, a psychosocial construct that relates to the control of resources, changes the perception of physical properties of objects. | YES | |
27 | 26 | Michalak, J., Mischnat, J., & Teismann, T. (2014). Sitting Posture Makes a Difference-Embodiment Effects on Depressive Memory Bias: Embodiment Effects on Depressive Memory Bias. Clinical Psychology & Psychotherapy, 21(6), 519-524. | Basic research has shown that the motoric system (i.e., motor actions or stable postures) can strongly affect emotional processes. The present study sought to investigate the effects of sitting posture on the tendency of depressed individuals to recall a higher proportion of negative self-referent material. Thirty currently depressed inpatients either sat in a slumped (depressed) or in an upright (non-depressed) posture while imagining a visual scene of themselves in connection with positive or depression related words presented to them on a computer screen. An incidental recall test of these words was conducted after a distraction task. Results of a mixed ANOVA showed a significant posture x word type interaction, with upright-sitting patients showing unbiased recall of positive and negative words but slumped patients showing recall biased towards more negative words. The findings indicate that relatively minor changes in the motoric system can affect one of the best-documented cognitive biases in depression. Practical implications of the findings are discussed. | YES | |
28 | 27 | Minvaleev, R. S., Nozdrachev, A. D., Kir’yanova, V. V., & Ivanov, A. I. (2004). Postural influences on the hormone level in healthy subjects: I. The cobra posture and steroid hormones. Human Physiology, 30(4), 452–456. | Cortisol, testosterone, dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA), and aldosterone were measured in the blood serum of healthy subjects who adopted the cobra posture (bhujangasana), a key posture of hatha yoga. The subjects were trained in yoga; blood samples were taken before and after the exercise at an interval of no more than 5 min. As revealed with a new confidence interval–evaluating method developed by A.I. Ivanov, cor- tisol decreased by 11% with a reliability of 0.99 in all subjects, while testosterone increased by 16% with a reli- ability of 0.95. Changes in DHEA and aldosterone varied. Proceeding from ideas about motor–visceral inter- actions, the authors hypothesize that, when the subjects adopted the cobra posture, the production of steroid hormones was controlled by neural mechanisms. | YES | |
29 | 28 | Nair, S., Sagar, M., Sollers, J., Consedine, N., & Broadbent, E. (2015). Do slumped and upright postures affect stress responses? A randomized trial. Health Psychology, 34(6), 632–641. | Objective: The hypothesis that muscular states are related to emotions has been supported predominantly by research on facial expressions. However, body posture also may be important to the initiation and modulation of emotions. This experiment aimed to investigate whether an upright seated posture could influence affective and cardiovascular responses to a psychological stress task, relative to a slumped seated posture. Method: There were 74 participants who were randomly assigned to either a slumped or upright seated posture. Their backs were strapped with physiotherapy tape to hold this posture throughout the study. Participants were told a cover story to reduce expectation effects of posture. Participants completed a reading task, the Trier Social Stress speech task, assessments of mood, self-esteem, and perceived threat. Blood pressure and heart rate were continuously measured. Results: Upright participants reported higher self-esteem, more arousal, better mood, and lower fear, compared to slumped participants. Linguistic analysis showed slumped participants used more negative emotion words, first-person singular pronouns, affective process words, sadness words, and fewer positive emotion words and total words during the speech. Upright participants had higher pulse pressure during and after the stressor. Conclusions: Adopting an upright seated posture in the face of stress can maintain self-esteem, reduce negative mood, and increase positive mood compared to a slumped posture. Furthermore, sitting upright increases rate of speech and reduces self-focus. Sitting upright may be a simple behavioral strategy to help build resilience to stress. The research is consistent with embodied cognition theories that muscular and autonomic states influence emotional responding. | MIXED | |
30 | 29 | Park, L. E., Streamer, L., Huang, L., & Galinsky, A. D. (2013). Stand tall, but don’t put your feet up: Universal and culturally-specific effects of expansive postures on power. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 49(6), 965–971. [4 studies] | Previous research suggests that there is a fundamental link between expansive body postures and feelings of power. The current research demonstrates that this link is not universal, but depends on people's cultural background (Western versus East Asian) and on the particular type of expansive posture enacted. Three types of expansive postures were examined in the present studies: the expansive-hands-spread-on-desk pose (Carney et al., 2010), the expansive-upright-sitting pose (Huang et al., 2011; Tiedens & Fragale, 2003), and the expansive-feet-on-desk pose (Carney et al., 2010). Of these postures, the expansive- feet-on-desk pose was perceived by both Americans and East Asians as the least consistent with East Asian cultural norms of modesty, humility, and restraint (Study 1). The expansive-hands-spread-on-desk and expansive-upright-sitting postures led to greater sense of power than a constricted posture for both Ameri- cans and East Asians (Studies 2a–2b). In contrast, the expansive-feet-on-desk pose led to greater power ac- tivation (Study 3) and action orientation (Study 4) for Americans, but not for East Asians. Indeed, East Asians in the expansive-feet-on-desk pose showed less power activation and action orientation than Americans in this pose. Together, these findings support a basic principle of embodiment — the effects of posture depend on: (a) the type of posture, and (b) the symbolic meaning of that posture. | YES | |
31 | 30 | Peña, J., & Chen, M. (2017). Playing with power: Power poses affect enjoyment, presence, controller responsiveness, and arousal when playing natural motion-controlled video games. Computers in Human Behavior, 71, 428-435. | Though playing with natural versus traditional game controllers affects game experiences, studies have not investigated how power poses affect the experience of playing natural controlled video games. Participants keeping powerful poses experienced increased enjoyment, presence, and controller responsiveness compared with those holding powerless poses. Congruent with self-perception and automatic activation models, mediation analyses uncovered direct effects of power poses and also indirect effects in which power poses increased power feelings, which in turn were associated with higher enjoyment, presence, and controller responsiveness but reduced arousal. This provides initial evidence for how physical poses affect people's experiences with natural game interfaces, and highlight basic self-perception and automatic activation mechanisms behind the effect. •We manipulated the physical poses of participants playing a motion-controlled game.•Power poses boosted enjoyment, presence, and perceived controller responsiveness.•Power feelings mediated power pose effects on enjoyment, presence, and responsiveness.•Power feelings were negatively linked to game arousal. | YES | |
32 | 31 | Peper, E., Booiman, A., Lin, I.-M., & Harvey, R. (2016). Increase Strength and Mood with Posture. Biofeedback, 44(2), 66–72. | Body posture can project non-verbally how we feel (Coulson, 2004; Pitterman & Nowicki, 2004). For example, when standing erect we occupy more space and tend to project power and authority to others and to ourselves (Huang, Galinsky, Gruenfeld, & Guillory, 2010). When we feel happy, we walk erect with a bounce in our step. We may jump with joy when we achieve our goals or collapse when we receive bad news. More and more in contemporary life we sit collapsed for many hours with our spine in exion. We crane our heads forward to read text messages, a tablet, a computer screen, or to watch TV (Straker et al, 2008; Asunda, Odell, Luce, & Dennerlein, 2010). Our bodies collapse when we think hopeless, helpless, powerless thoughts, or when we are exhausted. We tend to slouch and feel “down” when depressed (Canales, Cordás, Fiquer, Cavalcante, & Moreno, 2010). | YES | |
33 | 32 | Ranehill, E., Dreber, A., Johannesson, M., Leiberg, S., Sul, S., & Weber, R. A. (2015). Assessing the Robustness of Power Posing No Effect on Hormones and Risk Tolerance in a Large Sample of Men and Women. Psychological Science, 0956797614553946. | In a growing body of research, psychologists have studied how physical expression influences psychological pro- cesses (see Riskind & Gotay, 1982; Stepper & Strack, 1993, for early contributions to this literature). A recent strand of literature within this field has focused on how physical postures that express power and dominance (power poses) influence psychological and physiological processes, as well as decision making (e.g., Carney, Cuddy, & Yap, 2010; Cesario & McDonald, 2013; Yap, Wazlawek, Lucas, Cuddy, & Carney, 2013). Carney et al. found that power posing affected levels of hormones such as testosterone and cortisol, financial risk taking, and self-reported feel- ings of power in a sample of 42 participants (randomly assigned to hold poses suggesting either high or low power). We conducted a conceptual replication study with a similar methodology as that employed by Carney et al. but using a substantially larger sample (N = 200) and a design in which the experimenter was blind to condi- tion. Our statistical power to detect an effect of the mag- nitude reported by Carney et al. was more than 95% (see the Supplemental Material available online). In addition to the three outcome measures that Carney et al. used, we also studied two more behavioral tasks (risk taking in the loss domain and willingness to compete). Consistent with the findings of Carney et al., our results showed a significant effect of power posing on self-reported feelings of power. However, we found no significant effect of power posing on hormonal levels or in any of the three behavioral tasks. | MIXED | |
34 | 33 | Riskind, J. H. (1983). Nonverbal Expressions and the Accessibility of Life Experience Memories: A Congruence Hypothesis. Social Cognition, 2(1), 62–86. | People seem to remember positive or negative material with greater ease when in corresponding mood states. These memory effects may sometimes be partially mediated by different expressions that people often naturally come to exhibit when in different moods. The present research tested a “congruence” hypothesis about the priming effects of facial and body posture patternings on memory retrieval. This predicts that the accessibility of pleasant experiences from one's own life history may be disproportionately increased when nonverbal expressive patterns are positive in valence instead of negative, such as when an individual smiles and has expansive physical posture; and the accessibility of unpleasant experiences from one's life history may be disporportionately increased when nonverbal expressive patterns are negative in valence instead of positive, such as when an individual frowns and has a slumped posture. The two experiments described here used different procedures, direct or indirect, to put subjects into either happy or sad expressions. The latencies with which individuals recalled pleasant or unpleasant life experience memories were then obtained. The results provide support for the congruence hypothesis, especially those for recall of pleasant memories. Other evidence appeared to suggest that facial expressions and postures make contributions to memory that are at least partially independent of mood. The effects of expressions on memory remained visible and similar even when adjusted for mood ratings. | MIXED | |
35 | 34 | Riskind, J. H. (1984). They stoop to conquer: Guiding and self-regulatory functions of physical posture after success and failure. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 47(3), 479. [3 studies] | Three experiments with 147 undergraduates tested the hypothesis that slumped (depressed) or upright physical postures are not just passive indicators of mental states but can reciprocally affect the mental states and behavior of an individual. By using a methodology similar to that in many facial manipulation studies, the experimenters changed Ss' postures in a standard learned helplessness setting. Results indicate that when a slumped posture was "inappropriate" to the current situation (an S had just succeeded), the slumping seemed to undermine subsequent motivation as well as feelings of control. But when "appropriate" (an S had experienced failure or helplessness), slumping minimized both feelings of helplessness and depression and motivation deficits. A new theoretical analysis—the appropriateness hypothesis—is therefore proposed: A slumped vs upright posture orientation can guide and moderate information-processing and responses to positive and negative mood-relevant stimuli. Implications regarding self-regulatory processes that may operate in emotion, depression, and learned helplessness are discussed. | YES | |
36 | 35 | Riskind, J., & Gotay, C. (1982). Physical posture: Could it have regulatory or feedback effects on motivation and emotion? Motivation and Emotion, 6(3), 273–298. [2 studies] | Four studies were conducted in a laboratory setting to examine whether variations in physical posture can have a regulatory or feedback role affecting motivation and emotion. The results of the first study, which were replicated in the second study, revealed that subjects who had been temporarily placed in a slumped, depressed physical posture later appeared to develop helplessness more readily, as assessed by their lack of persistence in a standard learned helplessness task, than did subjects who had been placed in an expansive, upright posture; surprisingly, there were no differences in verbal reports. The third study established that physical posture was an important cue in observers' verbal reports of depression in another person. The fourth study further explored the role of posture in self-reports of emotion using another posture. The results indicated that subjects who were placed in a hunched, threatened physical posture verbally reported self-perceptions of greater stress than subjects who were placed in a relaxed position. The findings of these studies are interpreted in terms of self-perception theory. It is suggested that physical postures of the body are one of several types of cues that can affect emotional experience and behavior. | YES | |
37 | 36 | Roberts, T.-A., & Arefi-Afshar, Y. (2007). Not all who stand tall are proud: Gender differences in the proprioceptive effects of upright posture. Cognition & Emotion, 21(4), 714–727. | Research shows that individuals feel and later perform better when given positive feedback in the context of an upright posture, as opposed to a slumped one, even if unaware that their bodily position is meant to express emotion. We sought to determine whether proprioceptive feedback from body postures operate differently for women and men. Participants received success feedback when in either an upright or slumped posture, which was covertly manipulated. Results showed that for men the effects of posture were intuitive and appropriate: receiving success feedback while upright enhanced performance self-ratings. In contrast, after adopting an upright posture, women went on after success feedback to perform more poorly and make more negative self-ratings, than after adopting a slumped posture. A number of theories are offered as potential explanations for this gender effect. | YES | |
38 | 37 | Ronay, Richard, Joshua M. Tybur, Dian van Huijstee, and Margot Morssinkhof. Embodied Power, Testosterone, and Overconfidence as a Causal Pathway to Risk-Taking. Comprehensive Results in Social Psychology, 2(1), 28–43. doi:10.1080/23743603.2016.1248081. | Previous work has found that configuring participants into high-power versus low-power physical postures caused increases in subjective feelings of power, testosterone, and risk-taking as well as decreases in cortisol. We attempted to replicate and extend this pattern of findings by testing for the mediating role of testosterone and overconfidence in the relationship between power poses and risk-taking. We hypothesized that increases in testosterone in response to high-power poses would lead to increases in overconfidence, and that this indirect pathway would mediate the effect of power posing on risk-taking. We were unable to replicate the findings of the original study and subsequently found no evidence for our extended hypotheses. Overconfidence was unaffected by power posing and unrelated to testosterone, cortisol, and risk-taking. As our replication attempt was conducted in the Netherlands, we discuss the possibility that cultural differences may play a moderating role in determining the physiological and psychological effects of power posing. | NO | |
39 | 38 | Rossberg-Gempton, I., & Poole, G. D. (1993). The effect of open and closed postures on pleasant and unpleasant emotions. The Arts in Psychotherapy, 20(1), 75–82. | 12 female and 12 male university students were shown photographs of 3 open and 3 closed postures and then assumed the postures in private. Before and after assuming the postures, each S completed an emotions checklist to indicate how he or she felt. There was a significant interaction between posture and emotion, suggesting that a given posture affects the type of emotion experienced by the person assuming the posture. Open postures elicited a slight reduction in pleasant emotions; closed postures increased unpleasant emotions. Degree of emotion was not affected by any of 4 types of expectancy instructions given prior to the experiment. When holding a closed posture, females reported a greater increase in some unpleasant emotions than did males, suggesting that females are better at reading certain internal unpleasant affective cues. | YES | |
40 | 39 | Rotella, K. N., & Richeson, J. A. (2013). Body of guilt: Using embodied cognition to mitigate backlash to reminders of personal and ingroup wrongdoing. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 49(4), 643–650. | Research demonstrates that people are sensitive to information that portrays either themselves or their ingroups in a negative light. Indeed, confronting individuals with their own past misdeeds or those committed by important ingroups can result in victim-blaming and refusals to apologize or make amends. Studies suggest that one reason why people demonstrate these backlash effects is that they immediately blunt the experience of guilt when confronted with either their own or group misdeeds from the past. The more individuals actually experience guilt, however, the more likely they are to respond to information about past wrongdoing with prosocial behavior (e.g., apologies, reparations, etc.). The present research sought to examine how subtle inductions of guilt shape responses to personal and group wrongdoing; namely, by manipulating individuals' body postures. Consistent with predictions, results suggest that embodiment-induced guilt reduces negative backlash and increases prosocial interpersonal and intergroup intentions. | YES | |
41 | 40 | Smith, K. M., & Apicella, C. L. (2016). Winners, losers, and posers: The effect of power poses on testosterone and risk-taking following competition. Hormones and Behavior. | The effect of postural power displays (i.e. power poses) on hormone levels and decision-making has recently been challenged. While Carney et al. (2010) found that holding brief postural displays of power leads to increased testosterone, decreased cortisol and greater economic risk taking, this failed to replicate in a recent high-powered study (Ranehill et al. 2015). It has been put forward that subtle differences in social context may account for the differences in results. Power displays naturally occur within the context of competitions, as do changes in hor- mones, and researchers have yet to examine the effects of poses within this ecologically relevant context. Using a large sample of 247 male participants, natural winners and losers of a physical competition were random- ly assigned to hold a low, neutral or high-power postural display. We found no main effect of pose type on tes- tosterone, cortisol, risk or feelings of power. Winners assigned to a high-power pose had a relative, albeit small, rise in testosterone compared to winners who held neutral or low-power poses. For losers, we found little evidence that high-power poses lead to increased testosterone relative to those holding neutral or low-powered poses. If anything, the reverse was observed – losers had a reduction in testosterone after holding high-power poses. To the extent that changes in testosterone modulate social behaviors adaptively, it is possible that the rel- ative reduction in testosterone observed in losers taking high-powered poses is designed to inhibit further “win- ner-like” behavior that could result in continued defeat and harm. Still, effects were small, multiple comparisons were made, and the results ran counter to our predictions. We thus treat these conclusions as preliminary. | MIXED | |
42 | 41 | Stepper, S., & Strack, F. (1993). Proprioceptive determinants of emotional and nonemotional feelings. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 64(2), 211. | This article reports 2 experiments that test whether both emotional and nonemotional feelings may be influenced by uninterpreted proprioceptive input. The logic of the procedure was adopted from studies by F. Strack, L. Martin, and S. Stepper (1988), who unobtrusively manipulated people's facial expressions. In the 1st experiment, a functionally equivalent technique was used to vary the posture of the body. Study 1 results revealed that success at an achievement task led to greater feelings of pride if the outcome was received in an upright position rather than in a slumped posture. Study 2 results revealed that nonemotional feelings of effort were influenced by contraction of the forehead muscle (corrugator), and Ss' self-ratings on a trait dimension reflected this experience when the facial contraction was maintained during the recall of behavioral episodes exemplifying this trait. To account for these results, a framework is proposed that draws on a distinction between noetic and experiential representation. | YES | |
43 | 42 | Strelan, P., Weick, M., & Vasiljevic, M. (2014). Power and revenge. British Journal of Social Psychology, 53(3), 521–540. | We took an individual differences approach to explain revenge tendencies in powerholders. Across four experimental studies, chronically powerless individuals sought more revenge than chronically powerful individuals following a high power episode (Studies 1 and 2), when striking a powerful pose (Study 3), and when making a powerful hand gesture (Study 4). This relationship vanished when participants were not exposed to incidental power. A meta-analysis revealed that, relative to a lack of power or a neutral context, exposure to incidental power increased vengeance among the chronically powerless and reduced vengeance among the chronically powerful. These findings add to previous research on relations between power and aggression, and underscore the role of individual differences as a determinant of powerholders’ destructive responses. | YES | |
44 | 43 | Teh, P.-L., Lim, W. M., Ahmed, P. K., Chan, A. H. S., Loo, J. M. Y., Cheong, S.-N., & Yap, W.-J. (2016). Does power posing affect gerontechnology adoption among older adults? Behaviour & Information Technology, 0(0), 1–10. | Recognising the rise of an aging population and independent living among older adults, many governments and organisations have developed and promoted new technologies in the form of gerontechnologies to support the needs and enhance the well-being of older adults. However, the adoption of products using such technology remains modest among the aging population. This study introduces the notion of power in the form of power posing and examines its impact on new technology adoption, particularly gerontechnology, among older adults. Using an experimental approach on a sample of older adults exposed to an in-house near-field communication-enabled light system, the study finds that high-power poses have a greater and more positive impact on older adults’ perceived ease of use of, perceived usefulness of, and intentions to use gerontechnology than low-power poses. Implications, limitations, and future research directions are discussed. | YES | |
45 | 44 | Turan, B. (2015). Predictors of anticipatory cortisol reactivity to subsequent stressors. Physiology & Behavior, 149, 239–246. | Understanding the nature, predictors, and consequences of anticipatory biological stress responses are important in understanding long-term effects of repeated stressors. We examined anticipatory cortisol responses after an individual has actually experienced and reacted to a stressor once and is anticipating a second similar stressor. We hypothesized that how an individual reacts to the first stressor may predict that individual's anticipatory re- sponses to further stressors. In Session 1, 77 male participants delivered speeches and performed arithmetic tasks in front of two evaluators. In Session 2 one week later, participants were told that they would do the same tasks again in front of evaluators. Stress cortisol reactivity in Session 1 (increase in cortisol from pre-stressor to post- stressor) predicted anticipatory cortisol reactivity in Session 2 (increase in cortisol from baseline to immediately pre-stressor). In addition, trait measures of low self-esteem and a “Submissive and Disconnected” interpersonal orientation predicted stronger anticipatory cortisol reactivity in Session 2. If the cortisol response to an initial stressor does in fact shape consequent anticipatory cortisol responses, this self-perpetuating nature of the initial cortisol response may contribute to negative long-term effects of repeated stressors on health. One factor that may be able to counteract this effect is a dominant and confident interpersonal orientation, which may lead to lower anticipatory cortisol reactions regardless of the response to the initial stressor. | YES | |
46 | 45 | Veenstra, L., Schneider, I., & Koole, S. (n.d.). Embodied Mood Regulation: The Impact of Body Posture on Mood Recovery, Negative Thoughts, and Mood-Congruent Recall. [2 studies] | Previous work has shown that a stooped posture may activate negative mood. Extending this work, the present experiments examine how stooped body posture influences recovery from pre-existing negative mood. In Experiment 1 (n = 229), participants were randomly assigned to receive either a negative or neutral mood induction, after which participants were instructed to take either a stooped, straight, or control posture while writing down their thoughts. Stooped posture (compared to straight or control postures) led to less mood recovery in the negative mood condition, and more negative mood in the neutral mood condition. Furthermore, stooped posture led to more negative thoghts overall compared to straight or control postures. In Experiment 2 (n = 122), all participants underwent a negative mood induction, after which half received cognitive reappraisal instructions and half received no instructions. Mood-congruent cognitions were assessed through autobiographical recall. Again, stooped (compared to straight) position led to less mood recovery. Notably, this was independent of regulation instruction. These findings demonstrate for the first time that posture plays an important role in recovering from negative mood. | MIXED | |
47 | 46 | Welker, K. M., Oberleitner, D. E., Cain, S., & Carré, J. M. (2013). Upright and left out: Posture moderates the effects of social exclusion on mood and threats to basic needs: Posture moderates effects of ostracism. European Journal of Social Psychology, 43(5), 355–361. [2 studies] | Adopting a powerful posture leads individuals to feel more confident and dominant. Social exclusion can strongly impact individuals’ mood and basic social needs. The current research combines these bodies of research, investigating the effects of dominant and submissive poses on responses to social exclusion and inclusion. In two experiments, participants held a slouching or upright pose and were either socially included or excluded using the Cyberball social exclusion manipulation. Social exclusion only affected participants’ mood when individuals took a powerful posture: Excluded participants in powerful postures had more negative mood after exclusion than included power-posing participants, but effects of exclusion and inclusion did not differ among submissive-posing participants (Experiments 1 and 2). Similarly, it was also found that social exclusion affected basic needs only when participants’ adopted powerful poses (Experiment 2). | MIXED | |
48 | 47 | Wilkes, C., Kydd, R., Sagar, M., & Broadbent, E. (2016). Upright posture improves affect and fatigue in people with depressive symptoms. Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry, 54, 143–149. | Background and objectives: Slumped posture is a diagnostic feature of depression. While research shows upright posture improves self-esteem and mood in healthy samples, little research has investigated this in depressed samples. This study aimed to investigate whether changing posture could reduce negative affect and fatigue in people with mild to moderate depression undergoing a stressful task. Methods: Sixty-one community participants who screened positive for mild to moderate depression were recruited into a study purportedly on the effects of physiotherapy tape on cognitive function. They were randomized to sit with usual posture or upright posture and physiotherapy tape was applied. Participants completed the Trier Social Stress Test speech task. Changes in affect and fatigue were assessed. The words spoken by the participants during their speeches were analysed. Results: At baseline, all participants had significantly more slumped posture than normative data. The postural manipulation significantly improved posture and increased high arousal positive affect and fatigue compared to usual posture. The upright group spoke significantly more words than the usual posture group, used fewer first person singular personal pronouns, but more sadness words. Upright shoulder angle was associated with lower negative affect and lower anxiety across both groups. Limitations: The experiment was only brief and a non-clinical sample was used. Conclusions: This preliminary study suggests that adopting an upright posture may increase positive affect, reduce fatigue, and decrease self-focus in people with mild-to-moderate depression. Future research should investigate postural manipulations over a longer time period and in samples with clinically diagnosed depression. | MIXED | |
49 | 48 | Wilson, V. E., & Peper, E. (2004). The effects of upright and slumped postures on the recall of positive and negative thoughts. Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback, 29(3), 189–195. | This study assessed whether it was easier to generate positive and negative thoughts in either an upright or slumped position. Twenty-four participants, who reported no clinical depres- sion or anxiety, completed the Tellegen absorption questionnaire and a self-assessment of imagery ability. Surface electromyography (sEMG) of zygomaticus major, heart rate, and respiratory rate were assessed across four 1-min counterbalanced conditions of either upright or slumped posture and either positive or negative thought generation. Posttrial checks of compliance were completed. At the end of the study, participants rated which thought was easiest to generate in the two postures. Significantly more participants (22), or 92%, indicated it was easiest to generate positive thoughts in the upright position. ANOVA of sEMG activity significantly distinguished positive and negative thoughts in both positions. Significant correlation coefficients were observed between scores on the Tellegen scale of absorption and the ability to generate thoughts quickly and between self-perceptions of imagery ability with the maintenance of thoughts across time. This study supports the finding that positive thoughts are more easily recalled in the upright posture. | MIXED | |
50 | 49 | Yap, A. J., Wazlawek, A. S., Lucas, B. J., Cuddy, A. J., & Carney, D. R. (2013). The Ergonomics of Dishonesty The Effect of Incidental Posture on Stealing, Cheating, and Traffic Violations. Psychological Science, 24(11), 2281–2289. [3 studies] | Research in environmental sciences has found that the ergonomic design of human-made environments influences thought, feeling, and action. In the research reported here, we examined the impact of physical environments on dishonest behavior. In four studies, we tested whether certain bodily configurations—or postures—incidentally imposed by the environment led to increases in dishonest behavior. The first three experiments showed that individuals who assumed expansive postures (either consciously or inadvertently) were more likely to steal money, cheat on a test, and commit traffic violations in a driving simulation. Results suggested that participants’ self-reported sense of power mediated the link between postural expansiveness and dishonesty. Study 4 revealed that automobiles with more expansive driver’s seats were more likely to be illegally parked on New York City streets. Taken together, the results suggest that, first, environments that expand the body can inadvertently lead people to feel more powerful, and second, these feelings of power can cause dishonest behavior. | YES | |
51 | 50 | Zabetipour, M., Pishghadam, R., & Ghonsooly, B. (2015). The Impacts of Open/closed Body Positions and Postures on Learners’ Moods. Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences. | When humans feel confident, lively, and active, they assume an open expansive posture, however when they feel helpless, insecure, and listless, they assume a closed and contractive posture. Hence, the question is whether open or closed postures affect EFL learners’ moods. This study would highlight the impacts of the bodily behaviors on the person assuming specific physical postures and is aimed at revealing the possible impacts of high/low power (open/closed) sitting postures on language learners’ moods. To this aim, 15 male Iranian English learners were asked to assume open, closed, and ordinary postures in nine 90-minute sessions. The data were collected through using a questionnaire and the participants’ self-narratives. The statistical analysis of the questionnaire and qualitative analysis of the self-narratives demonstrated that closed postures have more negative impacts on moods while open postures have more positive impacts. | YES |