PR-3 Shoulder Shrugs

Visual Description

One or both shoulders are raised upwards, in a protective manner, before falling back down quickly.

PR-3 Shoulder Shrugs

Cognitive Etiology

As mentioned with Rigid Posture, Judgment creates a baseline bodily tension corresponding to a need for physical and cognitive control. With Shoulder Shrugs, the upper body tenses even further, before relaxing, showing a temporary and acute presence of Judgment, and positional defensiveness.

As with Head Shakes, this signal implies a cognitive negation. While Head Shakes may have their vestigial origins in the instinct of infants to avoid food, the raising of the shoulders up can be thought of as a means to physically protect oneself from threats; an instinct which is now extended even to conceptual threats or ideas. Thus, it similarly reveals a cognition that is actively showing disapproval of something, judging a given idea as being opposite to their convictions and positions.