Tells of the Nose
Some of you may be thinking that I’ve really lost it this time. It may seem incredulous that after explaining tells of expressive body parts like the feet, hands, eyes, mouth, and more, I’ve moved onto…the nose!
Yes the nose! The schnoz! The snout! Whatever you want to call it, it’s often overlooked. Most poker players focus on the eyes or the mouth but ignore what’s in between. The nose can tell us quite a bit and by the end of this article you might be wondering what else you’ve been overlooking at the table all this time.
When I fi rst started in law enforcement in 1975, I was told that when people lie they touch their nose. Think of any bad acting job or person in denial and you know exactly what I’m talking about. People touch their noses to hide emotions and to pacify themselves. In fact, people often touch their noses all the time, but just like in law enforcement, it’s the why that is important to us in poker.
Our nose, unlike our primate cousins, adapted to our environment. In the tropic regions it remained large to deal with warm air and humidity, while in the northern regions it became narrow and long to warm up the cooler air. Somewhere in the process, this adaptation became signifi cantly larger in length and width. The prominence of our nose became something of an oddity and a sloped curiosity.
Our nose no longer has the acuity it once had for scents, and yet we still use it to fi nd food, avoid the putrid, warn us of dangers (i.e., fi re), humidify the air we breathe, appreciate a rose, and – in courtship – identify pheromones and sense testosterone and even oxytocin.
Something that has this many functions should enjoy considerable real estate within the brain. As it turns out, it does. So what does this mean to you? It means the nose is always active, for obvious and less than obvious reasons, and it is sensitive to the world around us. The nose knows… and tells.
At the poker table, watch how often people touch their noses. Some squeeze it, others scratch it, rub it, and some pinch it. We do these things dozens of times per day for a variety of reasons. Primarily we pinch or squeeze our nose to make sure that it does not dry out and maintain its moistness. When we are stressed, our nose tends to dry out and it automatically alerts us. The hairs inside become erect and sensitive to air movement. By squeezing our nose, we ensure that it remains moist and comfortable.
We also touch our nose because the nerve endings on the surface serve to pacify us. Primates rub noses in nature and so do we when we are intimate. Of course we know about Eskimos rubbing noses. It’s those very nerves that serve to stimulate us and release oxytocin, which is vital to establishing relations.
In poker one needs to observe how often players touch their nose as a result of stress. We play a game of stress. Stress caused by bluffi ng, a short stack, being forced to fold, or any other stress. Stroking, touching, or massaging serves to pacify us and calm us down. The pacifying feeling that our nose provides is similar to the touching and rubbing of our faces. Our hands simply look for a location which will ease our stress and our nose is a prime candidate at all times.
The nose, which is interconnected with the brain’s amygdala, also serves to tell us when things are not right. Not just when something stinks (actually smells), but when things are not right. We crinkle our nose upward when something is putrid, but we also do it when we see things we don’t like – like a rag hand. This micro gesture (it occurs in less than 1/5th of a second) is very powerful and accurate. Remember that we only crinkle our nose when things are bad, never when we are content, satisfi ed, or happy. This should give you a clear indication of your opponent’s position. It occurs in real time and gives us persuasive proof of what a person truly feels.
Look for the nose crinkle in both amateurs and professionals. Even the best in the game aren’t immune to this tell and I’ve seen numerous household poker names fall victim to this instinctive reaction and give away information during critical situations.
Our nose is the major portal for breathing and as such, it activates for physical activity. We know that in intimacy our nose becomes warm and pliable so that it will relax enough to dilate and let in our partner’s pheromones. In everyday life our nose (the nasal wings to be exact) will dilate or open up right before we embark on or anticipate physical activity. We see this in sprinters about to run. What we see at the poker tables is that the nose of the player who is so yearning to get some action (meaning that he has a strong hand) will begin to dilate as he waits his turn to go all in. His nose betrays his mind’s decisiveness to take action.
So there we have it. And I bet you thought the nose was just something to rest your sunglasses on. Visually, some tells of the nose are diffi cult to detect, but as with anything else, determine a baseline for each of your opponent’s tell centers and be aware that when they change, you should understand the reasons why and begin to interpret the cause. For those players who habitually dilate their noses as a tick or habit, you can ignore the behavior, except when it goes away as that may be signifi cant. As for the rest, remember that the nose tells us a lot and it’s nothing to sniff at.
