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COMM 2500 Section 016
TedTalk Critique
13 February 2025
TedTalk Critique
Dr Amy Cuddy is the speaker in this video. The context in which she is delivering the
speech is at a Ted Talk in Edinburgh, Scotland. Dr Cuddy is an American Social Scientist who is
presenting on how humans nonverbal communication or in other words body language can affect
their lives. The speaker’s message is about the importance of body language and how it can
affect your life. This topic interests me because as a college student job interviews are more
common. I have been employed since I was in high school, and I understand the importance of
looking presentable at a job interview. Despite knowing this Dr Cuddy’s speech helped me
understand the deeper scientific significance of bringing a positive attitude and presentation to a
professional setting.
Dr Cuddy was able to transition into her points smoothly and effectively. Her speech was
mostly chronological, and her use of flashbacks attributed positively to the understanding of her
speech. For example, she began the speech by speaking of primal body language examples in
gorillas and later transitioned into the importance of posture in self-esteem. Later in her speech
she touched on a story of one of her MBA students struggling with imposter syndrome. Dr
Cuddy then transitioned into a flashback story of how she struggled with imposter syndrome as
an older student who completed her education at Princeton and Harvard. Through this story she
emphasized the importance of “Fake it until you become it” which strengthens the overall
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significance of her speech on tricking your mind into being more confident with slight changes
in your body language.
Dr Cuddy used many forms of research including past research from fellow social
scientists as well as her own research. Her research included finding that people who sat in
high-power poses felt more confident than those who sat in low-power poses. This strengthened
her argument because she was able to provide meaningful results in accordance with her point.
Dr Cuddy was extremely articulate and was able to smoothly transition between her
points, however she did stutter quite a bit during her speech and stumbled over her words a
handful of times. She counteracted this by appearing confident and relaxed while maintaining a
tall, sophisticated posture and staying open and inviting to the audience. Dr Cuddy was wearing
formal clothing appropriate for the event.
The speaker was conversational because she connected with the audience by being
vulnerable with them in a constructive way to her main point. She was able to do this by telling
the audience about her story of feeling like an imposter.
I do believe that most of Dr Cuddy’s claims are valid, including that power posing
increases confidence levels. However, her inability to provide more statistically significant
results of how power posing alters testosterone and cortisol levels make me doubt the validity of
that part of her research. I do agree with the Forbes author in that Dr Cuddy’s research was met
with such a great amount of scrutiny because of her ability to communicate such an advance to
such a large-scale audience. These findings can give the work force a step up that might not be
beneficial to companies looking to hire the best workers. If everyone being interviewed is faking
it until they become it the hiring companies will be impacted negatively.
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Dr Cuddy communicated her message as ethically as her research led her to. I do not
think that Dr Cuddy had any ulterior motives, she simply communicated her findings and those
of other researchers. Although we now know that the results from testosterone and cortisol
testing have not been replicated raise uncertainty, the other parts of her research are enough to
show how something as small as fixing your posture can make you a more confident person.
I have learned many things from this experience including how to better present myself in
job interviews and in regular social environments. For a long time, I have struggled with
communicating with others in a confident and effective way and this Ted Talk from Dr Cuddy
showed me the importance of believing in myself and my ability to improve and better myself.
Listening to this speech will change my future in a positive way because it has given me a new
effective strategy to help me travel through my academic and professional career in a stronger
way.