Summary: A new study demonstrates that a person’s physical posture subtly influences their emotional state and economic decision-making without their conscious awareness.
Key Facts
- Implicit Posture Control: Unlike previous “power pose” studies criticized for demand characteristics, researchers manipulated posture naturally via adjustable tablet stands and desk heights, confirming via post-experiment interviews that participants were unaware their posture was being studied.
- Objective Posture Quantification: The team used specialized video software to record and measure participant neck angles, establishing an objective physiological benchmark for posture adherence.
- Enhanced Strategic Risk-Taking: Participants sitting upright demonstrated more effective risk-taking on a virtual balloon inflation task, accumulating higher rewards without succumbing to reckless impulsivity.
- Elevated Feelings of Pride: Subjective self-reports revealed that participants in the upright posture group experienced statistically higher levels of pride, a key emotional marker of positive self-regard and confidence.
- Ergonomic Environmental Implications: Demonstrates that subtle daily environmental constraints, such as desk setup, smartphone placement, or workstation ergonomics, can continuously influence affective states and cognitive performance.
Source: McGill University
A person’s posture appears to affect their emotions and decision-making ability more than they realize, according to new research from McGill University. In a recent study, participants sitting upright performed better at a risk-taking task and reported more positive feelings than did their peers in the slouching or control groups.
Though the effects were modest and observed in a laboratory setting, the results highlight the body’s influence on our mood and behaviour, said Jorge Armony, professor in the Departments of Psychiatry and Psychology at McGill and senior author of the study.
A cover story to influence body position
Armony and graduate student Soren Wainio-Theberge, who originated the idea for the research and is a co-author of the paper, recruited nearly 200 participants from the McGill community.
After some initial testing on a computer monitor, they asked them to complete a new task on a tablet, under the guise of testing a mobile application. For some, the tablet was positioned on a stand on an adjustable table, to encourage an upright posture while sitting. For others, it was placed flat on the desk, which was also positioned at a lower setting, prompting participants to hunch over.
Participants then completed a risk-taking test, in which players can earn rewards by inflating a virtual balloon, but risk losing everything if it bursts. Over the course of the task, participants in the upright posture took greater risks and tended to earn greater rewards.
“This suggests they were not acting more impulsively but rather were engaging in more effective risk-taking,” explained Armony.
In the accompanying questionnaire, participants in the upright group also reported significantly higher feelings of pride, which is associated with a positive mood.
Bringing new insight to posture research
The findings shed light on the long-debated notion that the body’s posture can influence the mind.
The McGill team tested this relationship while avoiding concerns associated with previous studies.
The researchers avoided telling subjects which posture to adopt, but, rather, influenced their choice without their knowledge. This helped address a common criticism of earlier “power pose” research: that results may simply reflect that participants responded to researchers’ expectations. In post-experiment interviews, most participants indicated that they were unaware their posture had been manipulated.
The researchers also used video software to measure neck angle as a benchmark for posture conformity. In previous studies, this had not often been measured.
The findings do not mean that changing posture can dramatically transform a person’s life, Armony cautioned, but it does raise interesting questions about whether everyday features of our environment – such as workplace ergonomics – can subtly influence mood and behaviour.
About the study
“Manipulating posture implicitly through environmental constraints influences mood and
risk-taking behaviour”, by Soren Wainio-Theberge and Jorge Armony, was published in the British Journal of Psychology.
Funding: The research was supported by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
Key Questions Answered:
A: Researchers used a cover story about testing a mobile application and varied the physical setup of the room. One group used a tablet elevated on an adjustable stand at a high desk, naturally inducing an upright posture. The other group used a tablet placed flat on a lowered desk, prompting them to hunch over naturally.
A: Earlier posture research was widely criticized because instructing participants to adopt “power poses” made the study’s intent obvious, creating demand characteristics where subjects acted how they thought researchers wanted them to act. The McGill study avoided this by keeping subjects unaware of posture manipulation and using video tracking software to objectively measure neck angles.
A: No. Senior author Jorge Armony noted that while the observed behavioral and emotional effects were statistically significant, they were modest in magnitude within a controlled laboratory environment. However, the findings indicate that workplace ergonomics and physical posture exert a continuous, subtle influence on mood and strategic decision-making.
Editorial Notes:
- This article was edited by a Neuroscience News editor.
- Journal paper reviewed in full.
- Additional context added by our staff.
About this psychology research news
Author: Aurelie Boucher
Source: McGill University
Contact: Aurelie Boucher – McGill University
Image: The image is credited to Neuroscience News
Original Research: Open access.
“Manipulating posture implicitly through environmental constraints influences mood and risk-taking behaviour” by Soren Wainio-Theberge and Jorge Armony. British Journal of Psychology
DOI:10.1111/bjop.70083
Abstract
Manipulating posture implicitly through environmental constraints influences mood and risk-taking behaviour
Adopting physical expressions of emotion has feedback effects on individuals’ mood and behaviour; for example, adopting the expansive and contractive body language of dominance and submission can affect individuals’ feelings of power. However, postural feedback paradigms almost exclusively use deliberate, active posture manipulations, which raise concerns about experimental demand effects and limit the ecological validity of the research.
Here, we addressed this issue by creating an incidental manipulation of posture in which the experimental environment encouraged participants to take on either an expansive or contractive posture, and measured the effect of our manipulation on self-report and behavioural outcomes.
We find that our manipulation reliably increases risk-taking behaviours (as measured by the balloon analogue risk task), an effect which is robust to confounding variables such as discomfort with the posture or awareness of the manipulation.
Furthermore, posture effects on self-reported pride are partially mediated by a measure of participants’ posture during the experiment (the angle of their neck), while risk-taking effects are moderated by posture and self-reported mood during the experiment.
Our results suggest that aside from deliberate ‘power posing’, incidental factors which affect posture in the real world (e.g., standing desks or ergonomic setups) may have impacts on individuals’ behaviour.
