Racial biases shape the way people interpret body poses

People reliably interpret expansive poses — with the arms and legs spread and the head held high — as a signal of dominance, or power. But work to date on perceptions of body poses has focused on White targets, note the authors of a new paper in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology: Attitudes and Social Cognition. As research shows that Black people are often stereotyped as aggressive, hostile and threatening, might an expansive pose lead others to perceive them as being more aggressive than a White person holding their body in exactly the same way?

Francine Karmali at the University of Toronto and Kerry Kawakami at York University found this is indeed the case — at least for Black men. They also report evidence that this could have all kinds of impacts on a Black man's professional and personal life.

In an initial study, 111 White undergraduate students were shown photos of White and Black men in a range of settings (behind or in front of a table, for example), adopting either an expansive pose or a constrictive pose (with the limbs held close to the body). Based on their impressions from the photos alone, they rated each target for dominance, aggression, competence and warmth. The team found that, compared with constrictive poses, expansive poses got higher dominance ratings for both racial groups. However, while this higher dominance was linked to greater competence in White men, for Black men it was linked to greater competence but also more aggression.

The second study involved not just White but other non-Black students. They were told that they were going to see images of business school students who had just finished a summer internship and been offered paid internships for the next year — but some had got more prestigious internships with better salaries. Their task was to rate how well they thought each student had done on their summer internship assessment and to predict the salary range for their new internship. The researchers found that White and Black men in expansive poses got better ratings than those in constrictive poses — they were judged to be more successful. But this effect was significantly bigger for White targets.

Next, a fresh group of participants (again all non-Black) were shown a selection of the photos, and asked to choose a partner to work with on a relationship-building task. The results showed that participants were more likely to pick White men in expansive vs constrictive poses. However, an expansive vs constrictive pose didn't make Black men any more likely to be chosen as partners. A follow-up study replicated this finding and also suggested that perceptions of aggression could be responsible: for Black, but not White, targets, expansive poses were associated with more aggression.

While there were a few inconsistencies in some findings on individual ratings across the studies, the work suggests that White men benefit more from expansive poses than Black people do. Whether or not this is also the case for White and Black women is yet to be explored.

But, as the team notes, there could be all kinds of ramifications. For example, adopting an expansive pose in a job interview in an attempt to convey confidence and competence could be less effective for a Black than for a White man. And for a Black but not White man, adopting an expansive pose in a criminal trial in an attempt to project self-assured innocence might be interpreted by non-Black jury members as aggression, and affect judgements of guilt. If expansive poses are linked with aggression for Black men, this might even influence a police officer's decision to shoot, they argue. They also make this point: "When officers instruct people to raise their hands and to spread their arms and legs, these expansive poses may increase racial biases."

In fact, write Karmali and Kawakami, there are all kinds of potential scenarios (including in demonstrations and protest marches) when expansive poses may have a positive impact for White people but have little effect or even a negative impact for Black people. "Thus, while one aspect of White male privilege is that White men are allowed to act bold, and may even be rewarded for this boldness, Black men do not benefit to the same extent or are even penalised for such nonverbal behaviours," the pair concludes.

• Emma Young (@EmmaELYoung) is a staff writer at BPS Research Digest