Assumptions based on messages communicated through body language and facial expressions.

Watch the show with the sound turned off.

 

What do you think the characters' relationships are based on the ways in which they are communicating? What are they feeling and expressing based on the nonverbal behavior you are observing?

 

I watched the show Are We There Yet? In the opening scene there are two women that look like they are arguing with each other it seems that one is the supervisor over the other one. Then in the next one there are two children and a man sitting around a table they seem to be having a conversation about something that the man was working with one the table he seems to be their father. Then the man says something and the children looked scared. In the next scene thee two women are shown in a police department with one handcuffed and the other one looks like she is fussing. Then a man comes in to the police department and tries to talk to the police woman. She frowns and points to a seat, he walks away. Then he talks to her again and she is smiling and then the lady that was handcuffed walked out with the man. I gather from the way they were interacting that they are married and that he is trying to talk to her but she will not let him get a word in. Then they get to what is their home and their children and the man that was with the children said something and left.

 

 

Now, watch the show with the sound turned on.

 

What assumptions did you make about the characters and plot based on the ways in which you interpreted the communication you observed? Would your assumptions have been more correct if you had been watching a show you know well?

 

 

I assumed that the two women were arguing with each other and they actually were not, they were talking about a project they were working on. I could not tell if one was the supervisor of the other. I assumed that the man was the father of the two children and it turned out that he was not their father but a friend of the families watching them while their father tried to get their mother out of jail. He did say that he was looking for a suspected terrorist by the call sign off “the telephone terrorists”.  Which it turns out the kids are the ones that he is looking for. I assumed that this show was about a dysfunctional woman with troubled teens. I was very wrong, even though I believe that the mother needs to learn how to handle her stress and anger better when dealing with people she has to deal with. If this had been a show that I have been watching for a while like Grey’s Anatomy I would have made more accurate assumptions about what I was watching.