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Nonverbal Communication is Liberated Through Technology

When I walked into the kitchen and found my two youngest sons giggling, I knew they’d been up to something. “What were you doing?” I asked. “Come see!” they gleefully invited. Walking over, I found them watching themselves on YouTube. They had posted a music video of their own creation. The clip was almost entirely nonverbal: it showed them dancing wildly, waving their hands in the air, making funny faces, and pretending (badly) to sing. When I asked them why they had created the video, they said, “Because we want our friends who are gone for the summer to be able to see us!” Sure enough, the rest of the evening was spent checking the number of “views” they had received, and texting their vacationing friends regarding the video.

As recently as 20 years ago, our ability to communicate nonverbally was radically restricted by technology. Phone calls limited us to vocal cues, and communicating on the computer meant seeing words on a screen—nothing else. Only one option existed for experiencing the full tapestry of nonverbal communication: face-to-face interaction. But now, nonverbal communication has been liberated through technology. We can upload and download photos and video clips on our smartphones, iPads, and laptops. We can podcast, stream videos, and post clips of ourselves—then alert all our friends via e-mail, Twitter, texts, and Facebook that our content is available for viewing. As of 2012, over 4 billion videos are viewed daily on YouTube (“YouTube Statistics,” n.d.).

This shift from technological restriction to liberation has created two notable outcomes. First, whereas we used to have just two communication modes—face-to-face interaction or methods with limited nonverbal content (such as phone calls or text-only online messages)—now we can choose various media that let us hear and see others when interacting. Second, we can use these media to better maintain intimate, long-distance relationships. A generation ago, soldiers stationed overseas waited a week (or more) to receive written letters from loved ones back home. Now, they can exchange messages rich with verbal and nonverbal expressions in real time via the Web. Like my sons and their YouTube video, friends separated by distance—through summer vacations or unanticipated relocations—can also maintain intimate connections through frequent sharing of video clips and photos.