First, what does it mean that these poses, these concepts ("power" as the desirable mode of relating to your coworkers for example) and even the key hormone we are meant to incite are so gendered? The poses are more essentially masculine than they are powerful. Have you ever seen a woman naturally with in the arm-around-the-chair pose, hips slunk forward and chest back? It would look quite unusual I think. As an employer, I'm not sure I want to select for testosterone (and I don't think I have so far). But maybe there is more to it.
Second, does it matter that attention is zero-sum? I would suggest that to ve convincing the author doesn't need to merely argue that body language manipulation is helpful, but that it is more helpful than, say, listening carefully, or preparing that much more for an interview, or even studying and thinking about human psychology more directly. You can only keep track of so many dimensions at once, and I'm not sold on the idea that I would benefit from privileging this dimension. Maybe I would, but that case hasn't been made for me yet.
I took burlesque dance lessons for a while. There was some time spent discussing posture and its use; I learnt some ways of standing that would make me look confident and sexy. There were some strong similarities to these "power poses" - but trust me, they were very, very feminine.
First, what does it mean that these poses, these concepts ("power" as the desirable mode of relating to your coworkers for example) and even the key hormone we are meant to incite are so gendered? The poses are more essentially masculine than they are powerful. Have you ever seen a woman naturally with in the arm-around-the-chair pose, hips slunk forward and chest back? It would look quite unusual I think. As an employer, I'm not sure I want to select for testosterone (and I don't think I have so far). But maybe there is more to it.
Second, does it matter that attention is zero-sum? I would suggest that to ve convincing the author doesn't need to merely argue that body language manipulation is helpful, but that it is more helpful than, say, listening carefully, or preparing that much more for an interview, or even studying and thinking about human psychology more directly. You can only keep track of so many dimensions at once, and I'm not sold on the idea that I would benefit from privileging this dimension. Maybe I would, but that case hasn't been made for me yet.