The Power of Posing: Do Body Display Instructions Have an Impact on Behavior in Daily Life?

Introduction

The present study investigated the effects of expansive and contractive body display instructions on adaptive behavior and affect within the context of personally relevant behavioral goals set in daily life. The moderating effects of motivational traits and symptoms of psychopathology were explored.

Methods

A sample of 127 adults identified personally relevant and challenging actions they wanted to take during each week for 12 consecutive weeks. Before taking action, participants were randomly assigned to listen to instructions for one of four body manipulations: (1) expansive, (2) contractive, (3) neutral, or (4) active control (i.e., walking in place). The behavioral outcome was the extent to which participants took the wanted action, and the affective outcomes were emotions, action tendencies, and appraisals.

Results

The results showed no effect of body displays on behavior (d = 0.06) nor affect (ds = 0.02–0.06). Neither motivational traits nor symptoms of psychopathology moderated the effects of body displays on behavior and affect. Changes in action tendencies (i.e., avoid reward, approach reward) and appraisals (i.e., appraised difficulty, importance, and self-efficacy) predicted taking action as planned.

Conclusion

The results indicate that the body display instructions under investigation did not have an effect on taking action or associated affect. Such findings are more consistent with theories suggesting variability in the association between the motor system, emotions, and behavior across contexts than theories suggesting invariant associations. Future research may investigate individualized body displays and whether the effects of body manipulations vary systematically with features of the context.