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    NV Presentation of Self Amp Amp Identity

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    The document summarizes the observations and findings of Sydney Broderick and Elsie Duininck regarding their research on nonverbal communication through shoe choice. They observed shoes in the Saga cafeteria at Wheaton College and on a flight from Minneapolis to Chicago. In both settings, most shoes were neutral colors like black, white, and brown. Functional shoes like sneakers and boots were most common, reflecting the contexts of college students and airport travel. While they could not determine individuals' motivations, they inferred shoe choices were often both practical and trend-driven. They suggest improving the research by directly surveying people about their shoe choices.

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    NV Presentation of Self Amp Amp Identity

    Uploaded by

    api-665038631
    93 views6 pages
    The document summarizes the observations and findings of Sydney Broderick and Elsie Duininck regarding their research on nonverbal communication through shoe choice. They observed shoes in the Saga cafeteria at Wheaton College and on a flight from Minneapolis to Chicago. In both settings, most shoes were neutral colors like black, white, and brown. Functional shoes like sneakers and boots were most common, reflecting the contexts of college students and airport travel. While they could not determine individuals' motivations, they inferred shoe choices were often both practical and trend-driven. They suggest improving the research by directly surveying people about their shoe choices.

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    nv presentation of self amp amp identity

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    The document summarizes the observations and findings of Sydney Broderick and Elsie Duininck regarding their research on nonverbal communication through shoe choice. They observed shoes in the Saga cafeteria at Wheaton College and on a flight from Minneapolis to Chicago. In both settings, most shoes were neutral colors like black, white, and brown. Functional shoes like sneakers and boots were most common, reflecting the contexts of college students and airport travel. While they could not determine individuals' motivations, they inferred shoe choices were often both practical and trend-driven. They suggest improving the research by directly surveying people about their shoe choices.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    93 views6 pages

    NV Presentation of Self Amp Amp Identity

    Uploaded by

    api-665038631
    The document summarizes the observations and findings of Sydney Broderick and Elsie Duininck regarding their research on nonverbal communication through shoe choice. They observed shoes in the Saga cafeteria at Wheaton College and on a flight from Minneapolis to Chicago. In both settings, most shoes were neutral colors like black, white, and brown. Functional shoes like sneakers and boots were most common, reflecting the contexts of college students and airport travel. While they could not determine individuals' motivations, they inferred shoe choices were often both practical and trend-driven. They suggest improving the research by directly surveying people about their shoe choices.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    of 6

    Broderick and Duininck 1

    Sydney Broderick and Elsie Duininck

    Dr. Langan

    Nonverbal Communication

    29 November 2022

    Nonverbal Observation: Shoe Choice in Relation to Self and Identity

    In our nonverbal communication research, we chose to look at how individuals present

    themselves by the shoes they wear. In our particular settings, we spent time observing and

    recording the gender, type of shoe, and main shoe colors of the subjects passing by. Going into

    our research, we were curious as to how much of people’s shoe choice depends on the purpose

    they serve – in other words, are they wearing a shoe to fit an activity they are doing? Although it

    is not possible to truly find the answer to this without personally speaking with the individuals,

    we were able to use context clues in order to come to conclusions about the patterns we saw.

    In looking at shoes, we decided to observe from different locations – the Saga cafeteria at

    Wheaton and an airplane headed from Minneapolis to Chicago. We each watched for 30 minutes

    in the afternoon which enabled us to record enough data to be able to find patterns in our

    findings. One of the general patterns we noticed was that we were both looking at primarily

    college-age people – students passing through the dining hall and students headed back to

    college after their respective Thanksgiving break. In the cafeteria, the genders, shoe types, and

    shoe colors of roughly 60 people were recorded, and on the airplane, approximately 50.

    In both our observations, most shoes were neutral colors, generally white, black, or some

    other solid color. Regarding types of footwear, there were a lot of sneakers, boots, running shoes,

    and various slip-on shoes. Of the shoes we observed, we noticed some recurring patterns.

    Saga (Sydney)
    Broderick and Duininck 2
    Many of the shoes worn in the dining hall seemed to be for practical purposes – for

    example, I observed on a cold and snowy day, so it only makes sense that I recorded a large

    number of boots and other closed-toed shoes. The large amount of tennis shoes also fits the

    functional purpose as I was looking at mostly college students entering the cafeteria for a quick

    bite to eat in between walking to and fro classes and potentially even exercising during the day.

    Additionally, a good amount of the sneakers worn were also popular sneakers and other “trendy”

    shoes. For instance, I noticed some Birkenstock slip-ons which are both functional in the cold

    weather, easy to slip on and walk around in as a student, and also are popular right now amongst

    college-aged kids.

    Airplane (Elsie)

    Many of the individuals boarding were college students wearing sneakers. Those who

    were older were wearing different brands than those who were younger. The young adults had

    more uniformity in what brand of shoe they were wearing while the older adults had diversity in

    brands, type and color of their sneaker/running shoe. 37 of the 46 recorded shoes were sneakers,

    running shoes, or slip-on athletic shoes. This implies many people were going for a shoe that was

    practical for travel and navigating an airport on their feet. This is considered functional rather

    than structural because people seem to be wearing them more for a specific purpose. I also

    noticed there was not much diversity in colors. This may be explained by the time of year, as it

    was all plain colors rather than bright or neon colors. Bright and neon colors tend to be worn in

    summer. Black, white and brown represented in the results seem to fit winter. All the boots I

    observed were brown or tan. No other colors were represented by those who wore boots.

    Saga (Sydney)
    Broderick and Duininck 3
    Although we were unable to properly answer why people were wearing the shoes they

    were, I think it is safe to assume that most of the individuals we observed wore their specific

    type of shoe for functional reasons, some with an added layer of trendiness. Since the reasoning

    behind people’s outfit choices is not possible to 100% know without asking the person, I think I

    would slightly alter my observations in the future. For a future study, I think it would be

    interesting and helpful to not only observe the items people are wearing, but to also survey them

    and ask more details about the shoes they are wearing and for what purpose to get a greater

    understanding as to why people wear the shoes they do. People can communicate many things

    through what they wear, and people will always make assumptions, even those in observation.

    That is why I think it is important to get the perspective of individuals firsthand as much as

    possible after observing in order to learn the most about their nonverbal behavior and be as

    accurate as possible in our conclusions.

    Airplane (Elsie)

    I learned that the geographical location of where you are observing plays a role in what

    you see nonverbally. I believe I would see different shoes if this plane was headed to Florida

    rather than a city in the midwest like Chicago. I also was in very close proximity to those

    boarding and felt a bit awkward staring at their feet and then looking up to record their gender. I

    would prefer to observe from afar. I think the airplane was overall a fascinating place to do this

    observation because I had the knowledge of where all the passengers were headed and clearly

    many were college age coming back to school after Thanksgiving break. For a future study, I

    would also like to include their clothing and accessories in my field notes because these were the

    indicators that these individuals were college students. Examples of this are backpacks and

    school hoodies.
    Broderick and Duininck 4
    Broderick and Duininck 5
    Broderick and Duininck 6

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