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WHEN SCIENTISTS ASK people to evaluate others based on the way they walk, there are a few standard answers people give.
Loose gait: must be an adventurous extrovert. Clipped shuffle: must be neurotic.
But scientists say those personality judgments are generally wrong.
The only thing that current research suggests we can accurately predict from someone’s walk is how vulnerable they are. That’s a scary idea, suggesting that our thoughts and feelings are perhaps more visible than we’d like them to be.
Recent evidence of that phenomenon comes from a 2013 study that found prison inmates who scored high on measures of psychopathy could pick out people who’d been victimised in the past, based partly on their walk.
For the study, researchers recruited 47 male inmates from a Canadian prison, all of whom had at least one conviction for a violent offence.
The researchers showed the inmates 12 video clips of men and women walking, and asked them to rate each person on their vulnerability to victimisation and explain their rating. The people in the video clips had already told the researchers whether they had ever been victimised in the past.
Results showed that inmates who displayed certain psychopathic traits were better able to discern which people had been previously victimised. What’s more, some of those inmates reported that they’d made their judgments based on the people’s gaits.
These findings build on earlier research on walking style and perceptions of vulnerability. A 1981 study, for example, found that inmates who’d been convicted of sexual assault consistently said people who had long or short strides and shifted their weight up and down would make better targets.
The researchers behind the 2013 study say their findings may help explain why certain people become repeat victims: “[S]ocial predators are attracted to external displays of vulnerability.”
While experts say psychopaths make up about 1% of the general population, the researchers on the 2013 study cite data suggesting that psychopaths are responsible for about 50% of violent crime. In other words, many violent criminals may be adept at picking up on vulnerability cues and spotting a potentially vulnerable target walking by.
Is it possible to change your walking style to give off an air of invulnerability? Maybe. But the researchers say that the effects of this training generally wear off over time.
If you’re looking to keep yourself safe by changing the impression you make on potential criminals, it’s probably best to focus on other factors besides your gait.
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Terrifying but sadly all too predictable as temperatures rise. You’d hope this would wake a few of the deniers up as it’s more local than some of the countries people chauvinistically dismiss. But alas these people would still be posting their copy and paste, Trump n dumpster science support, while the fire or flood is on their doorstep.
@SerotoninWars: you do realize they’ve had wildfires all over the globe for centuries?
@Niall English: You do realise that they have been far worse in recent years on account of climate change?
@Niall English: You do realise that ever more parched woodlands catch fire ever more easily, which spreads ever more quickly?
@JOHN O CONNELL: You mean when there were only a few millions of people?
And vast areas of the planet were covered in forests?
Imagine that!
@JOHN O CONNELL: Those fires were caused by a collision with fragments of a comet. What is your point?
@JOHN O CONNELL: Younger Dryas
It must have all grown back, from being burnt the last few years
@P. V. Aglue: You think houses and factories grow back?
What did the Greeks ever do for us?
@Padraig O’Brien: The birthplace of western thinking.
@Padraig O’Brien: Plato, Aristotle Euclid’s geometry aid the foundations for European rationality and scientific inquiry, and influenced the development of European science and mathematics. The epics of Homer and the tragedies of Euripides and Sophocles deeply influenced European literature; their Greek humanism, that emphasized individual dignity, profoundly affected the development of European and American literary traditions. The music of Ancient Greece, particularly the theoretical frameworks of harmonics developed by the likes of Pythagoras, laid the foundations of Western music theory. And the political ideas of Ancient Greece, particularly the concept of democracy as practised in Athens, have had a lasting impact on European politics and systems of government.
@David Jordan: I frequently reread an old school text book on ancient Greek history by Bury.
(Am reading it again at the moment.)
Fascinating.
@David Jordan: “The music of Ancient Greece, particularly the theoretical frameworks of harmonics developed by the likes of Pythagoras, laid the foundations of Western music theory”.
And then (c)rap came along and that all went out the window.
Here in Bulgaria the fires started in June and keep going. There is several at any given time, and once a fire is put down, another one starts in a different place. There are constant appeals for volunteers to help the fire service, who are exhausted. Turkey sent fire trucks to help, and the Chesch republic sent two planes. What seems to be missing is coordinated EU level approach to this – Southern Europe is burning, and will continue burning every summer. Did someone ask Ursula what the plan is?
@ Thesaltyurchin and David Jordan
Are ye too young to have seen Monty Python?
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