ABSTRACT
A huge number of cues are supplied by one’s physical appearance, clothing, hairstyle, tribal marks, tattoos, incisions and other marks on the skin. Various colour shades also communicate different messages. Non-verbal communication is regarded as potent in terms of its impact on audience perception.1 Mehrabian and Ferris corroborate this with their often-quoted statistics that “55% of impression formation is based on visual cues, 38% on vocal cues, and only 7% on verbally transmitted content of a message.”2 It should be borne in mind that interpretation of these cues is still context specific rather being “a law of nature.”3 That is why, for instance, in North America black attire signifies mourning but in other parts of the world white and even red signify the same sense of loss.4
