“ She took the baby on her arm, and, with a burning blush, and yet a haughty smile, and a glance that would not be abashed, looked around at her townspeople and neighbors”[4] and “The unhappy culprit sustained herself as best a woman might, under the heavy weight of a thousand unrelenting eyes.”[5]

1.2.3 Facial expression

Facial expression also has the same function as eye contact. If one is angry or happy, we can easily discover it through his or her facial expression. It is well known that the westerners are good at expressing all kinds of facial expression. While Chinese people always make slight action, such as ladies’ smile without showing the teeth or smile with hand covering her mouth. The reason lies in that Chinese people are more implicit than the westerners, as the westerners are educated to be individual in their childhood.

1.2.4 Hand action

Hand action plays the same role as the two kinds above. It complements what we have said. If one is calling someone when he or she is far away from the other, even we can’t hear what he or she said, we also can understand by his or her hand that moves towards himself or herself. However, different hand actions give different meanings. In America, there are many meanings about hand action. When you want to call someone to come to you, you put up your index finger upward and move forwards frequently. When you want to take a ride in the side of the road, you raise your thumb up. Hand signs are the most meaningful one in nonverbal communication.

On the evening of Chinese Spring Festival 2005, CCTV held a wonderful program Guanyin with Thousand Hands. All of the actresses are deaf mute, but they can act so gracefully on the stage. They communicate by hand language, which connects them to the outer world and the people around them. It is significant as it surprises everyone who lives in the verbal world. They consider it the most beautiful words in nonverbal communication.

1.2.5 Touching

Touching is a sensitive topic for many people. It also expresses one’s culture background. Therefore, different cultures have their own meaning for touching. It seems that Chinese people and westerner have great difference in touching. We can see this from the news on TV when President Hu Jintao visited other countries, like America, he shaked hands with President Bush but still kept some distance, while the Arabian greet their guests by touching their faces. Besides, there is a survey between the Asian and the westerner. People live in Asia touch less than those in western. The fact may lie in that Asian is influenced by convention. They always control their behavior especially in public. While the westerners think they are free to express, thus they emphasize more on the right of human.

1.3 The functions of nonverbal communication

The function of nonverbal communication mustn’t be ignored in communication. Nonverbal communication encompasses more than one activity. People always consider it as the complement of verbal communication. However, it is not limited to one kind of function. Samovar etal said, “Most scholars think throughout the face to face communication, only 35 percent of the content are verbal, the rest are transferred by nonverbal behavior.” [6] Besides, one’s behavior gives more information than that given by talking during communication.

It is true that nonverbal communication has important connection with verbal communication. If there is no nonverbal behavior the conversation will not go on well. In addition, nonverbal communication can’t express its meaning if there is no context. In all, they connect closely to each other.

Nonverbal communication has value in human interaction; our nonverbal behavior had many uses and functions in communication. “Let us examine five of them: (1) repeating (2) complementing (3) substituting (4) regulating (5) contradicting” [7]

(1) Repeating

In the nonverbal communication, people often use nonverbal messages to repeat a point. If you can’t understand what one means, that person will repeat the same behavior to you until you understand at last. Such as, if someone disagrees with the other one, he or she would shake his or her head for several times to convey the meaning. Besides, the gestures repeated have reinforced the words meaning.