📊 poll results
Power Posing: can standing like Wonder Woman for two minutes actually change your hormones and your life?
🏆 Leading: **The core effect is real — poses shift confidence and behavior.** The headline hormone claims — that a two-minute pose measurably raises testosterone and lowers cortisol — were the weakest part of the original study, and it's fair that those specific numbers didn't hold up in larger replications. But throw out the hormones and there's still a real, repeatable finding underneath: how you physically hold your body changes how you feel and how you act, even if the mechanism isn't glandular. Multiple follow-up studies, including some of the same larger replications that debunked the hormone claims, still found that people who adopted expansive postures *reported* feeling more powerful, took on more financial risk in decision-making tasks, and were rated by outside observers as more confident during interviews. [color=green]That's not nothing[/color] — it just means the honest version of "power posing works" is a psychological and behavioral effect, not a biological one. Treating the whole idea as debunked throws out a real, useful finding along with an overstated one.

**The core effect is real — poses shift confidence and behavior.** The headline hormone claims — that a two-minute pose measurably raises testosterone and lowers cortisol — were the weakest part of the original study, and it's fair that those specific numbers didn't hold up in larger replications. But throw out the hormones and there's still a real, repeatable finding underneath: how you physically hold your body changes how you feel and how you act, even if the mechanism isn't glandular. Multiple follow-up studies, including some of the same larger replications that debunked the hormone claims, still found that people who adopted expansive postures *reported* feeling more powerful, took on more financial risk in decision-making tasks, and were rated by outside observers as more confident during interviews. [color=green]That's not nothing[/color] — it just means the honest version of "power posing works" is a psychological and behavioral effect, not a biological one. Treating the whole idea as debunked throws out a real, useful finding along with an overstated one. is leading so far with 50%.

**It's a textbook case of the replication crisis — the effect isn't real.** Take a step back and look at what the original 2010 study actually was: 42 college students, a lab task, and self-reported feelings — a sample size far too small to responsibly generalize into a global TED talk claiming physiological change. When researchers with far larger, better-powered samples tried to reproduce the testosterone and cortisol findings starting in 2015, [color=red]the effects vanished[/color]. Not weakened — vanished. Perhaps most damning: Dana Carney, one of the three original co-authors, published a public statement in 2016 saying she no longer believed the power posing effect was real and that she wouldn't run the study again. When a scientist disavows her own famous finding, that's about as strong a signal as psychology ever gives. Power posing survived in the public imagination mostly because it was an appealing, actionable story — *just stand a certain way and change your life* — not because the evidence held up under scrutiny. is second. On this few votes the split is still anyone's guess.

Everyone who has answered so far is voting from China.

The poll is still live and picked up a vote today.

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📊 poll results
Power Posing: can standing like Wonder Woman for two minutes actually change your hormones and your life?
50%
Leading answer
**The core effect is real — poses shift confidence and behavior.** The headline hormone claims — that a two-minute pose measurably raises testosterone and lowers cortisol — were the weakest part of the original study, and it's fair that those specific numbers didn't hold up in larger replications. But throw out the hormones and there's still a real, repeatable finding underneath: how you physically hold your body changes how you feel and how you act, even if the mechanism isn't glandular. Multiple follow-up studies, including some of the same larger replications that debunked the hormone claims, still found that people who adopted expansive postures *reported* feeling more powerful, took on more financial risk in decision-making tasks, and were rated by outside observers as more confident during interviews. [color=green]That's not nothing[/color] — it just means the honest version of "power posing works" is a psychological and behavioral effect, not a biological one. Treating the whole idea as debunked throws out a real, useful finding along with an overstated one.
results so far
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**The core effect is real — poses shift confidence and behavior.** The headline hormone claims — that a two-minute pose measurably raises testosterone and lowers cortisol — were the weakest part of the original study, and it's fair that those specific numbers didn't hold up in larger replications. But throw out the hormones and there's still a real, repeatable finding underneath: how you physically hold your body changes how you feel and how you act, even if the mechanism isn't glandular. Multiple follow-up studies, including some of the same larger replications that debunked the hormone claims, still found that people who adopted expansive postures *reported* feeling more powerful, took on more financial risk in decision-making tasks, and were rated by outside observers as more confident during interviews. [color=green]That's not nothing[/color] — it just means the honest version of "power posing works" is a psychological and behavioral effect, not a biological one. Treating the whole idea as debunked throws out a real, useful finding along with an overstated one.
**It's a textbook case of the replication crisis — the effect isn't real.** Take a step back and look at what the original 2010 study actually was: 42 college students, a lab task, and self-reported feelings — a sample size far too small to responsibly generalize into a global TED talk claiming physiological change. When researchers with far larger, better-powered samples tried to reproduce the testosterone and cortisol findings starting in 2015, [color=red]the effects vanished[/color]. Not weakened — vanished. Perhaps most damning: Dana Carney, one of the three original co-authors, published a public statement in 2016 saying she no longer believed the power posing effect was real and that she wouldn't run the study again. When a scientist disavows her own famous finding, that's about as strong a signal as psychology ever gives. Power posing survived in the public imagination mostly because it was an appealing, actionable story — *just stand a certain way and change your life* — not because the evidence held up under scrutiny.
**It's real, but only as self-perception — not biology.** The most accurate answer is probably the least satisfying one: both sides are half right. The biological claims — the specific testosterone and cortisol shifts — did not replicate in larger, more rigorous studies, and treating them as settled science was always premature. That part of the popular narrative should be retired. But subjective, self-reported confidence is a different story. [color=purple]Multiple studies still find[/color] that when people are instructed to stand or sit in more expansive postures, they *describe* feeling calmer and more in control afterward, similar to how other simple behavioral rituals — a pre-game routine, a power outfit, a rehearsed opening line — can shift someone's mindset without doing anything to their hormones. That's a real psychological phenomenon worth taking seriously, even if the mechanism is expectation and self-perception rather than biochemistry. Power posing might genuinely help you *feel* ready — it just doesn't turn you into someone else on a cellular level.