ANCIENT YIDDISH wisdom has taught that “the eyes are the mirror of the soul”.
Not so, according to Big Brotherresident psychologist Prof Geoffrey Beattie, who insists the true indicator of a person's sentiments is to be found a little further south.
Prof Beattie, head of the School of Psychological Sciences at Manchester University, told The Irish Timesit was possible to read someone's mind by studying their hand movement.
“People are unconsciously programmed to move their hands,” he explained. “We edit our speech very carefully but we don’t control our movement. The single best indicator of when someone is lying is to pay close attention to their hands.”
Returning to his native Belfast to deliver a lecture at Queen’s University on new research into bodily communication, Prof Beattie illustrated his argument with examples from international politics.
He claimed that the body language in footage of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown during Mr Blair’s time as prime minister clearly showed a latent animosity between the two.
According to Prof Beattie, while Mr Brown could be seen nodding and smiling during Mr Blair’s discourse, his hand movements betrayed a veiled dislike for the then prime minister.
The footage showed Mr Brown rubbing his own head and face while Mr Blair was speaking.
These, in Prof Beattie’s view, are “self-comforting gestures” unconsciously made by the former Chancellor of the Exchequer to neutralise his displeasure while listening to Mr Blair.
Prof Beattie, who holds a PhD from Cambridge, went on to insist that what he calls “gestural” communication stays longer in the memory than verbal communication.
He said: “That’s why, in the Democratic candidate campaign, Clinton and Obama picked up on all this stuff. There were certain things that they wanted to put into the unconscious channel.”
Prof Beattie added that he had also put his gestural communication theories to good use on the TV reality show Big Brother, on which he has been resident psychologist for nine years. Celebrities on the programme often gave their true feelings away on the show through their hand movements, he said.
He defended the reality show when asked if he considered it detrimental to its contestants’ psychological wellbeing. “It’s like any major life event,” he argued. “You could say that going off to university or to secondary school are similar to the set-up of the programme as they represent big life changes.
"The biggest harm that Big Brotherdoes is that people going in there think they're going to become celebrities. When that doesn't happen, there's a feeling of resentment and anger. But, on the other hand, you can get angry and resentful from a lot of life experiences.
“Celebrity returns us to a primitive evolutionary state,” Prof Beattie concluded. “We have evolved as beings unused to anonymity. When celebrities walk down the street people recognise them. It’s the threat that that might be taken away which causes the damage. It’s not really about celebrity, I think it’s more fundamental that that. I think it’s about recognition.”