Yesterday the Austrian journalist Armin Wolf did an interview with the
Russian President Vladimir Putin.
When we watch the body language of both of them
we see a difference.
Vladimir Putin sits quite relaxed.
Well, he's almost sprawling in his chair and that is a form of dominance.
Because he shows us: he is the one who sets the rules
and the others have to please him or have to follow those rules.
We can see
that relaxed body language throughout
the whole interview while
Armin Wolf is constantly sitting in a very upright position.
The first reaction Vladimir Putin is
showing throughout the whole interview,
is a smile.
But the smile is not really friendly.
It's a smile with a strong exhaling sound and normally we do that
when we push things away from us and
that is not an inviting signal.
It appears that he is not really impressed by the first presumption that Armin Wolf has.
Vladimir Putin is showing also motions with his feet.
Not so much with his upper
body but he is whipping and rocking with
his feet and that is normally if there
is more energy in a body then we can
show or then is needed right now.
Because he's not interested? Because he's nervous? Or because he is impatient?
Typical for Vladimir Putin: it seems hard for him to keep eye contact.
He constantly looks away and no matter if he is just listening or if he is talking,
it is hard for him to keep eye contact for a longer
period of time with one exception, I come
back on that a little bit later.
And we don't know why Vladimir Putin has a hard time keeping eye contact
but we can see the effect and the effect is
always: you are not important enough.
Or: I am not interested in you or it might
also be: I want to avoid you.
And one interesting thing, as you can see here, Vladimir Putin is raising his eyebrows.
On the one hand raised eyebrows is a
signal of: I'm interested!
That's why when we are interested, when we are astonished,
we raise the eyebrows really high up
but what Vladimir Putin is also doing he
keeps his eyelids shut or at least half shut.
And that says to us: well I'm
interested but not enough.
A little bit of arrogance can be interpreted with this facial expression.
What Putin does
he smiles with just one side of the
mouth and that seems as if the brain
wouldn't have decided whether it thinks
that this question, that this words are
fun or interesting or even nice or not.
And that seems to be a little bit cynical.
Then there's a huge change
in Putin's body language.
Interestingly exactly in the moment when Armin Wolf is quite insisting when he's talking about
the conflicts in Kosovo, Ukraine and
Chechnya.
Putin's gestures are in the front.
He is in the area of the table, he
is coming closer to Armin Wolf,
he's leaning forward, his facial
expressions are way more open and that
is the real Vladimir Putin.
Because
normally he is quite reserved,
he is reluctant in showing facial expressions
and he's reluctant in showing gestures
but when he is getting emotional,
when he's trying to get his point across
we can see he is capable of doing that.
And that is authentic.
Because his motions come just a little bit before he is saying the words.
First we show emotions and then we say
the words.
Altogether he's showing a lot of dominance,
altogether he is also
showing that he can be really authentic
and quite open.
