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If you are into your date, mirroring his or her Body Language shows you are interested, former FBI special agent Joe Navarro explained. Virtual dating is hard. It can seem nearly impossible to make a genuine connection while constrained to the flat rectangle of a video screen, but there is still a lot that people can gather from a person's body language.
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Body language experts say a clean, well-lit video can help you make a good first impression on your virtual date.
“People are used to seeing each other in a more nuanced way, such as seeing all of the body including hand movement and changes in skin and lip color. You don't normally focus on those things because they happen naturally, but the absence of that leaves us lacking, however, there are ways to read your date's body language over video call and put your best foot forward for a successful virtual date,” said Navarro.
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For a Video Call
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Be genuine and make sure you are interested in the other person instead of being interesting, said Lillian Glass, a body communication and body language expert based in
Signs Your Date Likes You
You can read your date's body language to decipher if he or she is interested in you, Navarro said. According to Navarro, someone who is entranced by another person will tilt his or her head toward him or her. "We only expose our necks to people we're really comfortable with," he said.
People who are interested in each other are more likely to preen, according to Navarro. Preening behaviors include fixing your appearance like touching your hair and straightening out your clothes.
Signs Your Date is Not That into You
Not all virtual meet-ups end with your date falling madly in love with you and that is all right. One sign a person is not feeling the love is if he furrows the glabella (the spot between the eyebrows) more, Navarro said. "This will happen, especially if the other person is saying something that's really dumb or stupid that's not attractive to you," he said.
Your date also might not be attracted to you if you see she is pulling away from the camera, or if she is moving a lot, Glass said. If your date is looking away frequently or appears distracted, that is another warning sign, she stressed. “Over a video call, people should take reading eye contact with a grain of salt, because it is normal for people not to know where to look or to look away periodically,” said Glass.
Navarro said, “Some people may also have more tension in their lips and even shift their jaw if they are not interested in the other person.”
Red Flags to Look Out For
There is no single behavior indicative of deception, said Navarro. Some behaviors indicate stress and anxiety. That can leave hints about whether your date is being truthful or not. When bothered, people often touch the suprasternal notch, the little notch above the sternum, he noted. When a woman is bothered by something, her hands move up there, and if a man is bothered, he tends to grab his neck, according to Navarro. "If I was asking somebody 'Are you dating somebody at the moment?' and they're touching this area, I'd have to wonder why," he said.
Fidgeting can also be a sign someone is not being honest, said Glass. "If they go on and on and they go off on a tangent, that may give you a red flag as to whether or not they're telling you the truth," she added.
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