Reading people’s cues can help you understand whether someone is comfortable, uncomfortable, nervous, angry, or even attracted to you. While people of all genders tend to have similar behaviors overall, there can be some subtle nuances more common among women. Here’s how body language experts break them down. One of the most common myths is that only women are fidgeting, playing with hair, or adjusting their outfits. People often think of these behaviors as being stereotypically “female,” Oud says, but that’s not the case. As humans, we engage in a lot of the same general actions, but how people execute those actions may vary. “When we look at body language, it’s about human body language,” Oud says. That said, some studies have found gender affects body language reading1; that is, your gender might affect how accurately you can read other people’s body language. Some research has found women are generally better at recognizing emotions in facial expressions, whereas other studies have found women to be better at recognizing negative emotions like anger and men can pick up on emotions like happiness with more ease. According to Cobb, women will generally pull a strand from the back or side of their head when flirting. “When they’re readjusting with the front, like a bang, that’s more nervousness,” she explains. “If you’re a guy and you’re looking for a date, you’ll look to see how a woman is acting toward you. That’s very fair,” Cobb says. Still, avoid making assumptions and always keep the context in mind. “Just because someone smiles at you doesn’t necessarily mean they like you,” she adds. Instead of taking one body language cue as a sign that someone’s interested, you should look for a cluster of clues that happen around the same time. Even if some women demonstrate flirting in a specific way, there are always outliers, Cobb adds. When we stop taking into account people’s unique tendencies, that’s where stereotypes come into play. Gender aside, Oud recommends anyone thinking about what their body language might be conveying to consider: Who am I, what are my behaviors and nonverbal communications, and is that effective for what I want to achieve?
