{"id":173939,"date":"2022-01-20T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-01-20T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ceotudent.com\/?p=173939"},"modified":"2026-08-16T10:30:00","modified_gmt":"2026-08-16T07:30:00","slug":"we-all-do-13-body-language-mistakes-that-make-you-look-bad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ceotudent.com\/en\/we-all-do-13-body-language-mistakes-that-make-you-look-bad","title":{"rendered":"We All Do: 13 Body Language Mistakes That Make You Look Bad"},"content":{"rendered":"

TL;DR:<\/strong> Body language matters, but the statistic everyone quotes is wrong. The claim that 80% of communication is body language comes from an over-generalisation of two studies Albert Mehrabian published in 1967. Mehrabian has explicitly corrected this misuse, stating that the equations were derived from experiments on communications of feelings and attitudes, and that unless a communicator is talking about their feelings or attitudes, the equations do not apply. The accurate reading is more useful anyway: when your words and your body contradict each other, people believe your body. That makes body language a question of consistency rather than decoration. The 13 mistakes below are framed that way, and the CEOtudent Context Weighting Table shows why the same mistake costs more in an interview than in a casual conversation. Understanding the principle beats memorising the list.<\/p>\n

Almost every article you have read about body language opens with the same statistic: 80% of communication is nonverbal, or sometimes 93%.<\/p>\n

We are not going to open with that number, because it is not true. But knowing where it came from is the best way to understand how body language actually works.<\/p>\n

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