Body Language: 20% More Testosterone in Minutes?
By Ali Kuoppala | Last reviewed Tue 25 September 2018
Medical Review by Dr. Stefano Pizzo, MD
What if I told you that you could get roughly 20% more testosterone in less than 2 minutes for free and from the comfort of your own home. What if I also told you that the trick is scientifically proven and pretty easy to do.
Want to know what it is?
Great, then take a look at this:
Body Language Influences Testosterone Production
Most of the communication we do is non-verbal, meaning that we speak more with our bodies and expressions than we do with our mouth.
It’s also a known fact that confident humans and animals both have a habit of showing “alpha” body language…
For example a baboon might express his power by holding his breath which causes his chest to expand. Whereas a successful business man or a boss can cross his fingers behind his head and lean back on a chair to open up showing that he isn’t afraid of taking space and is in control.
Insecurity and weakness can also be seen through body language. Actions such as restless legs and fingers, closing up to a small space, crossing arms, not making eye contact, and hunched up posture all show that you’re scared, weak, and not in control.
It’s all in our evolution, these models are somewhat “hard coded” into our brains, and we often do these things without noticing it ourselves.
But could showing powerful “alpha” body language actually make us more powerful and confident? And could weak body language really make you more weaker and inferior?
That’s what this study from Cuddy et al. examined:
They had 24 test subjects who gave their baseline saliva hormones to the researchers and then were randomly assigned to groups where they would do either “power-poses” or “low-power-poses”. (poses used in the study shown below).
Each subject held the pose for 2 minutes and then the researchers again tested their salivary hormones to see if there was anything different going on…
Remarkably the results showed that only a mere 2 minutes of holding a “power-pose” was enough to increase testosterone levels by 20%, whereas the stress hormone cortisol also decreased by -25%.
The “low-power” group saw a -10% reduction in salivary testosterone levels and a 15% increase in the stress hormone cortisol.
These results show that when you express power and leadership through your body language, your brain and hormones will pick up and follow, actually making you more powerful, confident, and relaxed.
Whereas when you’re expressing weakness and insecurity through closed up and hunched postures, then your brain and hormones will again pick up, but this time they make you weaker and more stressed up.
Here’s an interesting video where the lead researcher of that study, Amy Cuddy, explains a bit more:
Conclusion
It’s not a myth that your body language can shape your brain, beliefs, and even hormonal parameters.
This incredible 20% increase in testosterone from just a simple 2 minute posture hack shows how easy it can be to boost testosterone levels naturally.
Just stand tall and relax. Oh and also, here’s 52 more ways to raise testosterone levels.
Ali Kuoppala