The Book of Tells (Peter Collett)[unlocked]

THE BOOK OF TELLS
Telleology promises to play an increasingly important role
in forensic science. In the old days the only tools available
to a detective were his keen senses. There have been
enormous changes since Sherlock Holmes looked out of
his window, noticed how a woman hesitated before crossing
the road, and informed Dr Watson that 'oscillation
upon the pavement always means an affaire du coeur'. 3
Although today's detectives recognize the need for a
trained eye, their task is made easier by the opportunity to
record people's actions, to view them repeatedly, and
to subject them to detailed analysis. A good example is
John Napier's analysis of the famous cinefilm of 'Bigfoot',
where he was able to show that the style of walking was
entirely humanoid. 4
Whether we like it or not, we're all involved with tells -
there's no escaping them. An enormous number of tells is
produced whenever we interact with other people, and
even when we remain silent in their company. Some of
these tells are under our control - they're the ones that we
use to present a particular image of ourselves. But there
are also tells that we cannot control, like blushing and
pupil dilation, as well as tells that we can control, but
don't, like preening, posture matching, and certain facial
expressions. As we noticed earlier, there are differences in
the way that we relate to unintended tells, because while
we may be painfully aware of the fact that we're blushing,
there's no way we could know that our pupils are dilated;
we are only ever aware of the treachery of our cheeks,
never that of our eyes. Equally, while we are quite capable
of positioning our limbs or moving our hands in ways that
are likely to give a certain impression, we often fail to
consciously control these features of our behaviour,
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