Social Awkwardness (Everywhere, Every Moment): Walking

I'd like to discuss the concept of walking. You may find this hard to believe, but similar to the idea of first impressions, the way a person walks can be an immediate judge of character. Psychology teaches us that we are all prone to bias, it is unavoidable, the mind naturally assumes things when meeting a person. First, you judge their appearance and then you judge their demeanor or the way they act, carry themselves or behave. Finally, the way they speak, with or without an accent, slurring words, etc. Haven't you ever wondered why James Bond movies sound so cool, perhaps its the English and British accents that make a person sound smarter. A person with a high pitched voice may sound more annoying and a person with a low pitched voice may intrigue you. Anyway, back to the topic at hand. Walking. It is such a simple thing to do when we are born we crawl and then we learn to walk, once you can walk, you are deemed a normal growing human. As you become older, the conversation about a confident walk begins to come into play, take drag queens for example, they have to strut in a confident manner because they have pride. Women in the old days and for the most part nowadays are taught sexy walks and this can be seen through models walking down a runway.

 

I believe a walk is attached to the level of confidence a person has. Someone who feels down, defeated, or ashamed, won't walk with their head up high and shoulders perked up, they will slouch and remain hidden in crowds. On the opposite hand, a confident, successful, proud person will walk with a sort of swagger. In terms of social awkwardness, haven't you ever noticed that people who walk down a hallway or down a park don't ever walk looking straight? You walk down a hallway and a person is walking opposite of you, you have a few options, make eye contact with them, nod your head, or look in all directions to avoid their eye contact. Nowadays, the go-to is to take your phone out, unlock it, and skim through it acting like you have a new notification or unread texts. I find this fascinating, surely social norms have taught us that if you walk straight down a hallway, fully focused and staring in front of you, no flinching of the head when someone walks by, this is awkward. I've tried this experiment a few times, I walk down a hallway, say in school, and there is someone walking towards me and I just stare right past them. Immediately I see them looking in all directions, looking down, or taking out their phone. In rare instances, they'll pretend they have received a phone call. Why might this be? Maybe they're seen as smaller compared to a guy like me walking with determination, it's as if I convey a person who knows where they are going, nothing can distract me. I believe this is also the case in interviews, second to the handshake, of course, the way you walk into the interview says a lot about your character. Do you walk in normally and start to look around, do you run in, do you creep in, or do you walk up to the interviewers and extend your hand. 

Another form of social awkwardness that occurs when walking is tripping. It's happened to everyone, you're in the mall, walking out of a store and there's a group of people walking towards you, sure as heck, you magically trip over your feet or trip over air and now the group is watching you as you try and play it cool. If you fell, well that's the end of your career old chap. Now imagine an attractive person is walking in front of you and you trip in front of them. You try and play it off by regaining your step and now your left awkwardly looking at them and waving like "I'm ok". Next time you're in a public place, look around, observe human interaction, more importantly, try the walking experiment. It is rare that a person who is walking the opposite of you in a hallway will ever just look straight, they will almost always look away, look down, or take their phone out.

As always, don't believe me...

See for yourself

Expressed by: Oscar Mendieta