Nonverbal Communication at the Mall

For this activity I went to the mall and observed two middle aged women talking. They were dressed formally and had name tags, I assumed they both worked at the same department store and were on a break. I sat near enough to clearly see their facial expressions and body movements, however, I could not hear the conversation at all. As one of the ladies was speaking the other seemed to nod along in the conversation and they each had their bodies facing each other. Obviously very seriously engaged in conversation. They seemed very unhappy and looked to be listening very intently to what the other had to say. They held eye contact for majority of their conversation and hardly even recognized those who were sitting beside them, who you could easily tell were listening in to what looked like a very serious and important discussion. Both used a lot of hand gestures when they were speaking and their facial expressions portrayed disgust and dissatisfaction. Their eyes told most of the story as they would arch their eyebrows, furrow their eyebrows, roll their eyes and use the infamous long blink. It seemed they were pressed for time as the one lady checked her cell and they both walked away quite quickly.

Their body language really showed their interest in the conversation and the fact that they were actually listening to each other, or so it seemed. They were very unaware of their surroundings and the fact that their eye contact never broke showed that. They weren't even bustled when a man sat down beside them. Just from watching their nonverbal communication I could easily read and feel the atmosphere between them. From only watching their bodies it was like reading an open book.