In battle for nonverbal dominance at U.S.-Russia summit, Putin was the clear winner, experts say

Carrie Keating was almost slack-jawed with amazement by the end of President Trump’s news conference with Russian leader Vladimir Putin Monday. Keating has studied the nonverbal gestures of politicians for three decades, but she found the performance between the two men on the stage nothing short of incredible.

“Whoever made the arrangements, they so clearly favored Putin. You saw him do almost every dominant behavior you could stage in social science lab study,” said Keating, a psychology professor who studies charisma and leadership at Colgate University.

Keating quickly ticked off more than a dozen nonverbal assertions of dominance by Putin — including Putin’s agile hop onto the podium (vs. Trump’s lumbering walk), Putin’s animated gestures and the way he often disregarded the audience when speaking.

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