Saturday, June 29, 2013

Nonverbal Communication Analysis No. 2445:
Sasha Alexander on Conan O'Brien -
Sexually Provocative Displays
(Video, Photos)





Sasha Alexander recently appeared on Conan. Just as O'Brien asked her about how she acts in sexually provocative scenes, she unconsciously displayed some very specific examples of such emotions before her later fictional-acting demonstration. This should come as no surprise, for even though she is a talented actress - this is NOT method acting. Like the rest of us, regardless of our professions - Sasha is first human.


At 0:07 she displays an evanescent "tongue in cheek" nonverbal along with a suppressed but sincere smile. Here a bulge can be seen created by her tongue against her right cheek

The body language of a tongue in cheek has several meanings depending on the other nonverbals with which it is clustered. Here it is sexually provocative. Some of the other meanings include sadness or grief, "I gotcha" or "I just one", an alpha dominant signal or even the telling of a lie.

Intriguingly the action of tongue in cheek helps to facilitate the suppression of other facial tells - such as duping delight (which often still is displayed a moment later) and it even may help to reduce the onset of tears in the setting of grief & sadness.

Moreover tongue in cheek displays tend to used one side when it is associated with an alpha signal (e.g. sexuality or I gotcha) and the opposite side when seen with a beta signal (lying, the suppression of crying).


A few seconds later during 0:13 - 0:15 the beautiful actress is feeling sincere sexual energy. This is completely understandable in the context of her confident sexuality and ability to act in this same way is brought to attention. Here she defaults momentarily to one example of a natural and normal baseline sexual display. When a woman's elbows move out significantly laterally, exposing the armpit(s) it is a strong sexual signal of readiness and/or attraction. This is often done in a brief preening display of a false hair adjustment. It's not that the hair is not being adjusted - but it is an epiphenomenon of the primary activity of armpit exposure. This movement puts the breasts on display and releases pheromones and/or pheromone-like substances which facilitate attraction. There is also the added and highly significant appeal of a sincere (Duchenne) smile of joy-happiness.

In short, in these moments Sasha is feeling alpha sexual.

See also:

Nonverbal Communication Analysis # 2434:  Brad Pitt's Tongue-in-Cheek regarding  Reasons for Choosing to Work on "World War Z"

Nonverbal Communication Analysis # 2352:  Mila Kunis' Tongue in Cheek  Graham Norton Part II

Nonverbal Communication Analysis # 2085:  Dina Eastwood - Tongue-in-Cheek Variant

Nonverbal Communication Analysis # 2233:  Body Language, President Obama, 20 Children and the Tongue-in-Cheek

Romance and Dating Secret # 231:  A Classic Female Sexual Display

Nonverbal Communication Secret # 1805:  The Most Beautiful Woman in the World  What Makes Her Even More Alluring?  Aishwarya Rai 

Nonverbal Communication Analysis # 2313:  Elisa Lam Video in Elevator at Cecil Hotel -  What Her Body Language Tells Us ....

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