The Voice Can Indicate When Someone Finds Us Attractive
There are various investigations that indicate the way we communicate non-verbally (and involuntarily) when we are attracted to someone For example, exposing your neck or the inside of your arms indicates interest, while crossing your arms does not.
However, not all of these discrete signals have to do with the position we adopt or facial gestures. According to research, there is also something else that gives us away. It’s about the voice, something we constantly use during flirting, whenever we dare to say something to that person that catches our attention.
There are many ways to explain the logic behind our tastes when it comes to finding a partner, and one of the most talked about in psychology is the one based on Evolutionary Psychology.
This perspective focuses on the way in which evolution has shaped the genetics that most human beings share and the way in which this influences how we behave. Reproductive behavior, in particular, receives a lot of attention by these researchers, since the strategies we use to find a partner and procreate have direct effects on genes.
In the case of the voice, it is believed that one of the reasons why men’s voice is more serious is because the genes behind this trait have been selected more times in women’s reproductive strategies. That is In men, a deep voice is attractive and that is why those who have it have a greater chance of having offspring (perhaps because these types of sounds are associated with large and, therefore, strong animals). In the case of women, the opposite happens: generally, those with higher voices are more attractive.
On the other hand, there is also data that indicates a curious phenomenon: people with a more active sexual life have voices that are more attractive. In this research, several volunteers of both sexes They had to rate the degree to which they were attracted to voices that had been recorded in sound recordings. Using this information and crossing it with the reports about the sexual lives of the people who gave their voice for the experiment, this strange pattern of behavior was detected.
Adjusting our voice to others
We have already seen that the voice is related to sexual preferences, but… how does it influence flirting once it has started? It is a pertinent question, since the voice not only serves to influence the assessment of the attractiveness of potential partners; Furthermore, we usually use it to make others like us more, even if we do not realize it. And that can be used to detect sexual or romantic interest that someone can express to us.
The key is to pay attention to the way in which our interlocutor adapts his or her voice so that it resembles ours. This phenomenon, called phonetic convergence occurs unconsciously almost every time we talk to someone we are attracted to.
Both the rhythm of speech and the intonation and tone are modified to emulate that of the other person, so that the other person feels comfortable in the conversation by feeling “in their comfort zone.” On the other hand, the opposite happens when we talk to someone we don’t like: we emphasize the properties of our voice that do not resemble those of the other person.
Furthermore, this tendency to modify our way of speaking occurs on a small scale during the first minutes we speak to someone, but also continues days and even weeks later. For example, research found that months after moving in together for the first time, several roommates tended to talk much more alike than they had on their first day together. Furthermore, the degree to which their voices matched those of others correlated with the degree to which each felt close to the other.
Part of the chameleon effect
Phonetic convergence can be understood as part of the chameleon effect, a tendency by which everything our non-verbal language adapts to that of the interlocutor unconsciously, normally when there is a climate of attraction or emotional closeness (or you want to reach it).
For example, some salespeople pay attention to the postures of their potential clients and imitate them, or try to make the speed at which they speak approximate that of the other person.
Conclusion
So, to know if someone likes you, always you can pay attention to the way their way of speaking evolves during the first minutes of conversation. On the other hand, if that person interests you, you can also try to voluntarily modify your way of expressing yourself so that the rhythms and sounds that make up your voice blend in with theirs.
