Humans are wonderfully vocal primates with a drive to communicate like no other primate.

We develop and retire languages

across the ages based on replacement by new and more useful ones.
In learning to read body language, you have to go through a process
of muting the vocal expressions that have blunted your senses to
perceive all of the other types of language. Now that English officially has one million
words, we officially have one million ways to
reduce our reliance on the senses.
The very technologies that help us cultivate communication with
language can exacerbate the problem. As you sit in a room or cubicle and interact with
people electronically, you may be putting your
ability to read body language to sleep. Until there is a more multisensory version of the
Internet than Web 2.0 (the one-millionth
word, by the way), we will rely on emoticons and text for a lot of our
messaging.
Even though human beings are designed to use and read body
language—an aspect of us that gives us a common bond with our
primate ancestors—we are typically on a bell curve in terms of the
ability to understand it. Some people are born with a limited ability or lack of ability to read
body language. They have to learn it
Introduction 25
just as you would have to learn the vocabulary and rules of another
language if you suddenly moved to a country where your native language wasn’t spoken.
In the case of people with Asperger’s Syndrome, for example,
language skills appear fine, but the condition affects the ability to
read gestures and perceive social conventions. After Maryann and I
wrote I Can Read You Like a Book, someone wrote an Amazon.com
review that affected us, and affected this book: “I had an unusual
reason to order this book—my child has a mild case of Asperger’s
Syndrome. This means that she lacks the skills to interpret body language unless she learns
it as a ‘second language.’ So I bought it with
her in mind. As I read it, I was surprised how extremely helpful it
was for ME. I honestly never realized how much I was missing! The
skills it teaches will help with relationships of all kinds, business and
personal.”
I’m not citing this to slip in an endorsement; I just want you to
see that understanding basic body language cannot be something we
take for granted.
Contrast an individual with Asperger’s with someone like
Frank Abagnale, the gifted imposter who now consults with the
Federal Bureau of Investigation and other law-enforcement entities. His ability to read
people and project competence—even as a
teenager—enabled him not only to pass millions of dollars’ worth
of bad checks, but also to gain acceptance as a pilot, physician, and
lawyer. No one taught him those body language skills, so his ability
is as natural as the inability of someone with Asperger’s to perceive
acceptance or rejection and everything in between