The United Nations general assembly gives us a rare chance to see world leaders speak from the same podium – and sometimes interact with one another, too.  Barack Obama, Vladimir Putin and Raúl Castro have all spoken from the stage this week – and the US president has publicly shaken hands with his Russian and Cuban counterparts. But what does their body language tell us about them?  Nonverbally in the presidents’ performances yesterday, Obama was self-confident and appealed to his audience with engaging directness. Putin, on the other hand, seemed devious – a bit guilty – as if he had something to hide. Specifically, Obama made direct eye contact with listeners and used palm-up gestures to bring them in, while Putin gazed downwards at his notes and kept his hands folded on the podium. While the US president’s body language spoke to us personally, with openness and immediacy, his Russian counterpart played it close to the vest, in secret, as if playing a poker hand.  Nonverbal communication is the process of sending and receiving wordless messages by means of facial expression, gaze, gestures, postures and tone of voice. While spoken words may be self-consciously edited, nonverbal cues have a lot to say – unconsciously – about emotions, feelings and moods. Putin’s avoidance of eye contact and reigned-in hand gestures, for example, made him come across as if he were a defensive high school student with a secret. Clearly, Putin’s body language failed to back the gravity of his doctrinaire words on Syria and the Islamic State.  In contrast, Obama’s words were backed by hand gestures that invited audience participation. He also made additional contact with people eye to eye. Through these nonverbal signs, Obama convinced listeners he was telling the truth. Avoiding eye contact and withholding hand gestures, as per Putin, are among the classic signs of deception, whether by omission or falsehood. It should be noted that the latter president further subtracted from his reliability quotient with frequent shoulder shrugs as he spoke. The muscle that lifts the shoulders, upper trapezius, is an emotional muscle that contracts whenever one feels uncertain –despite the “certainty” of one’s spoken words.  After their speeches at the UN, the two presidents met face to face for 90 minutes and shared – nonverbally – the disappointingly negative results of their meeting. No words were spoken as they shook hands, without facing each other and without leaning their bodies meaningfully into the handshake. Both gave the same nonverbal cue: visibly tightened lips. Barely noticeable lip-clenching signals unvoiced opposition or disagreement. Like the shoulder shrug, in-rolled lips are controlled by gut-reactive “special visceral” nerves. Barely noticeable cues, indeed, but meaningful to all who see them.  The mannerisms of a third president, Cuba’s Raúl Castro, add contrast to the world leaders’ speeches at the UN. On Tuesday, Castro read from notes held in his hand and glanced up jerkily from time to time. His quick glances, which were not aimed at individual listeners in the audience, gave nervous energy to his words, while holding the bright white papers in his fingers silenced his hand gestures. Of the three presidents, Castro’s nonverbal presentation connected least with the audience. He addressed not listeners but the notes in his hand.  Related: Raúl Castro and Barack Obama all smiles before US sanctions meeting  Yet another contrast in presidential body language was visible in the face-to-face meeting between Castro and Obama. Nonverbally flat in his delivered speech, Mr Castro came visibly alive in the meeting, with animated, friendly hand gestures, direct eye contact and expansive smiles. Obama returned these affiliative cues, leaning toward Castro and facing him directly, signaling an unspoken intention to move physically – and emotionally – closer to his new political friend.  Contrast this with Obama’s very visible leaning and angling away from Putin. The key emotion in these latter, evasive body postures was, seemingly, an unvoiced wish to separate.  Despite spoken words to the contrary, the body does what it feels like doing. In presidential politics, words matter, but body language counts too.
The gestures of the US and Russian presidents told stories that clashed as much as their words, a body-language expert explains in an analysis of their behavior