The body language changed dramatically in the third and final debate of the three British political party leaders. The smiles and laughter belied the grappling that occurred now that the gloves are off. David Cameron finally reached his peak as a speaker; he achieved an air of being determined but also relaxed, with a consistency that was near faultless. Nick Clegg’s easy demeanour was ruffled by Cameron’s criticisms of him, causing Clegg to become more imploring and petulant. Gordon Brown has continued on his downward trajectory of loosening control of his natural nonverbal habits, which had predictably poor effects on his appearance. From a purely body language perspective, Cameron outshone Clegg, in part because he put Clegg on the defensive.

There was one simple rule in Debate 3: Whoever smiles most loses. Laughter is even worse. Smiles can look good, but only when appropriate. In debate 3 there was no bonhomie as there was in the previous debates, so every smile exposed a tiny loss of emotional control.

Cameron almost never smiled, which came across as very focused and serious. By contrast Gordon Brown let his laughter and smirks get the better of him, and he looked like he was competitive, dismissive, and even having fun — all completely inappropriate for the seriousness of his opponents. Clegg’s response to Cameron’s baiting also led to him laugh in exasperation. The laughter came across as slightly flustered and un-statesmanlike. Cameron unfailing seemed above it all.

Cameron’s biggest improvement was to periodically switch between standing straight up and leaning his left elbow on the podium. By sometimes resting on the podium, which is a pose he regularly assumes against the despatch box during Prime Minister’s Questions, it meant his shoulders regularly moved, so that his upright posture did not look at all stiff, as it did in the previous debates. Cameron’s leaning on the podium undoubtedly reflects the fact that he is now much more relaxed with the television debate format; it also caused him to lean slightly forward and made him look more engaged. Gone were his errors from previous debates, such as unconsciously stepping back or tilting his neck back, which made him look aloof, disengaged and aristocratic. Cameron was exquisitely disciplined about addressing the camera constantly after initially acknowledging the questioner from the audience. Along with the slight furrowing of his brow, this perfected his aura of determination.

Clegg’s previous advantage, in which he criticised the others while they avoided criticising him, was eliminated by Cameron’s reproaches. To defuse these, Clegg implored the audience with a higher pitched voice and up-turned two-handed begging gestures. Even though his hands were not cupped but closed fists, the pleading came through in his voice tone, and it simply did not look like the stuff of leadership. As Clegg’s image already suffers from not enough gravitas for the job of Prime Minister (if only because he looks too young), his weakness in the face of Cameron’s seemingly effortless offensive undermined Clegg’s plausibility.

Poor Gordon Brown decided to be himself, which is a beau geste at a personal level, but it makes his party look Quixotic on television. Sadly, his tireless attacks on Cameron gave credence to Cameron’s claims that at a deep level Brown is desperate and his only approach is to scare people — Brown looks genuinely negative as a person. He would have to practise in front of a mirror for a year to fix his smirky smile, but Brown unveiled it ceaselessly during the debate, not only during point-scoring and suppressed disagreement, but he deliberately finished his final statement with it. Yuk! He also was often looking in the wrong direction. His unanswered attacks on Cameron were accompanied by completely turning his body to his uninterested opponent, and Brown did not look down the camera nearly enough.

The ultimate question raised during this final showdown was how Gordon Brown ever agreed to these debates in the first place. Two weeks ago I posited on BBC Radio that Brown did it because he believed in democracy, while Paul Taggart (Professor of Politics, University of Sussex) suggested it was because Labour were so far behind they had nothing to lose, but either way it has turned out to be a personal disaster for Brown. He has transformed Clegg from an unknown to the likely king-maker. Even if Labour hangs on to enough seats for a coalition government, Brown himself will be dethroned at Clegg’s pleasure — with the rest of Brown’s cowed party using the debates as justification for sacrificing their intimidating boss. Which is just as well, as he looks like he needs and deserves a real vacation.

There is no question that the Party Leaders Debates have completely transformed the landscape of the 2010 British general election. These debates snowballed the recognition and interest in the Liberal Democrats, and that can be attributed to Nick Clegg’s extraordinary performance. Of course substantive policy is central to how people make political decisions, and Nick Clegg has spoken about Lib Dem policies. But all those policies pre-existed the debates, yet the public was mostly ignorant of them. What made the difference was that the public was bored, angry and alienated with politics. The public wants change. The public wants something new and exciting, and Nick Clegg gave them something that was new to many of them.

Even if ultimately the public as a whole does not want Lib Dem policies, which are much further from the political centre than Labour or the Conservatives, the idea of something new has stirred up a lot of interest in the political process, and in the Lib Dems in particular. This can almost certainly be attributed to Nick Clegg’s informal yet passionate demeanour. Not only is Clegg believable, but he explains all the issues as if everything was common sense. Instead of being tedious by talking extensively about tax credits, he has presented easily understood ideas such as saving very large amounts of money on the Trident nuclear programme to pay for things like military expenditure and the deficit.

But body language also had a huge role to play in his being more attractive than the other leaders. From the very first debate Clegg has been highly critical and negative about the other two parties, yet at no point has he been accused of “punch and judy” politics. Because of his body language. Clegg has regularly interrupted the other leaders to make his own points, yet no one has thought it to be rude or self-important. Because of his body language. Clegg has laughed disparagingly at one of Gordon Brown’s criticisms, yet this was seen as exasperation, not haughtiness. Because of his body language. Quite simply Clegg has gotten away with displaying emotions and rhetorical techniques that would appear disagreeable or abrasive on the other party leaders. Not only does this give him an edge in the war of words, but it makes his position – as a leader – much more credible.

And leadership is ultimately what these debates are about. A leader is not simply the best administrator. A leader is not the person who thinks up the best policies, which can be done by researchers behind the scenes, nor is a leader the wise man who selects the best package of policies. A leader is someone who gets people to follow.

This is why style (and body language) is so important, and why these debates have advanced Gordon Brown’s downfall. Gordon Brown plainly does get other politicians to follow him; he has been an obvious liability in the polls for a long time, and yet no plausible rebellion within his party has occurred. Admittedly Brown is an impressive administrator, and even in the debates his mastery of the facts and memory for details is awe-inspiring. But that is plainly not enough to keep challengers at bay. The other politicians in his party must be terrified of him.

But that won’t wash with the general public. The public cannot be intimidated into voting for a candidate, even if he is right. It is no coincidence that in the second debate David Cameron took the debates to a self-reflective level by saying that Labour was trying to scare people. Admittedly, all the parties are using negative campaigning, because it persuades the public faster than appealing to them, but it seems that Labour has nothing wildly positive to offer. The public also want to be seduced.

So, is it all a good thing? Does having these debates, with all their focus on body language, make politics superficial – like a beauty contest? Mea culpa, there will be some aspects of these debates that make it more like a beauty contest, but it also changes the role of the public in our democracy. It is no coincidence that during the debates two issues of democratic reform were discussed without opposition: a fully elected house of lords and the ability of the electorate to remove an MP. This is revolutionary stuff. If approved, an MP could be removed even if they had broken no laws or parliamentary rules, so all it would take would be a political difference with their constituency. Presumably a recall vote could be championed (or funded) by the MP’s political opponents. Yet all three parties agreed on this innovation during the debates, which could have been instituted decades if not centuries previously. The British democracy, with its Prime Minister being chosen by MPs rather than by direct vote, has plainly started moving toward a more direct role for the public. Is this change worth opening a Pandora’s box filled with body language and aspects of beauty contests? It depends on what you think about giving power to the people.

From a body language perspective, in the second of the British Leaders’ Debates all three party leaders were more confident than last week, but this worked against Gordon Brown. It was very close race between David Cameron and Nick Clegg. Cameron came across as statesman-like, while Clegg was more relaxed and engaged with the voters - declaring a winner would be a matter of taste. I would give Clegg a small edge because Clegg definitely has an extraordinary way of using nonverbal communication to connect with everyone: the live audience, the TV audience, and the other party leaders. Gordon Brown definitely went downhill from last week, because he became more comfortable and less self-controlled, and unfortunately his natural style of public speaking is quite off-putting.

David Cameron has vastly improved since last week, most importantly on being less anxious, more engaged and not aloof. Specifically his legs were together, his posture was not leaning backward, and his head was not tilted back. Judging by the freer movements in his shoulders, Cameron was much more confident and comfortable. As planned he spent much more time addressing the camera. On some occasions he achieved a strongly empathetic voice and facial expression, which paints a more varied emotional picture. Overall, Cameron successfully achieved a balance of his dignified and upright appearance, while connecting with both the TV audience and the live audience.

Gordon Brown did improve his body language errors from the last debate, but he let other body language problems creep into his performance. While Brown maintained his determined and serious demeanor, this was undermined by his infamous smirk. His rehearsed jokes were accompanied by his terrible smile, and his grin reappeared whenever he was proud of what he has said; as usual it takes him too long to recover from these smiles. Unfortunately, he just has a bad smile, and it radically affects his style. We also saw the return of his claw hand, and of his head shaking whenever another party leader says something he disagrees with. When Gordon Brown takes a moral stand, it tends to sound sanctimonious because his voice becomes low and monotone, which makes it sound boring. This particular voice tone may explain the common vox pops when people say, “I’m tired of hearing Gordon Brown say X” or “I’m bored of listening to Gordon Brown say Y”.

There is something special in the performance of Nick Clegg, in that he has an extraordinary register of emotions and a phenomenal judgment of what he can do on stage. He makes many criticisms of both of the other party leaders, but his disapproval is never seen as “punch and judy” politics. He regularly interrupted the other speakers, but his interruptions look completely reasonable – they seem neither rude nor self-important. When he laughs disapprovingly at what the other party leaders are saying, it does not come across as superior or snide but as exasperated. He successfully registers emotions that on other party leaders would look unpleasant or nasty.

The best feature of this debate was that the party leaders often took their communication to the reflective level, commenting (accurately) about the structure of each other’s comments: Clegg referred to point scoring, Cameron talked about scaring people, and even Brown talked about getting real. The absolute high point from a stylistic perspective was when Clegg was asked the potentially embarrassing question by the moderator about possible irregularities in his campaign finances; he dismissed the entire topic in a sentence and without pausing looked at the audience member who had asked the previous question and changed the topic back to her question. In terms of handling that challenge according to the rules of these debates, that was a stroke of genius.

As far as the debates are concerned, it now seems certain that any party leader must be telegenic – it is a pre-requisite. Once again there were no gaffes by any of the party leaders, but Cameron did score a point about Labour’s campaign literature misrepresenting the conservative position. There is no question the party leaders are learning from their past stylistic mistakes and are settling into their roles. The debates have progressed to a level of interplay and disagreement that make them interesting and less stilted. The debates also seem to have raised voter registration, although for undecided voters the debates may not have provided any clear-cut decision. It also seems that looking straight to camera (after briefly addressing the audience), which Clegg mastered in the first debate and Cameron frequently did in the second, elicits a more positive response from the TV audience than more naturalistically addressing the audience or the other party leaders. For the next debate Brown must completely jettison his witticisms, prepared jokes, and smirks, while Clegg will probably return to his previous style of talking to camera. David Cameron deserves plaudits for the most improved performance; he needed to raise his game, and he did.

Nick Clegg’s body language conveyed the most fluid and comfortable style during the first ever Prime Ministerial Debate in Britain. Gordon Brown came across as steady, but potentially stuck in his ways, while David Cameron’s body language was dignified and upright, but at times constrained, and even superior. Clegg made the most the most of his opportunity to be seen on equal footing, Brown avoided any body language blunders, and Cameron missed his moment to press his advantage.

Despite claims that the beginning might set the tone for the whole debate, Nick Clegg recovered from a nervous start to be the most interesting character in the debate. He is the least experienced of being in the public eye, and in his opening statement he frowned twice, particularly after mentioning, “The fair society that we all want” – as if he doubted he might deliver it. His inexperience also showed when he put his hand in his pocket on a number of occasions. However, he was the most fluid, as seen in the easy movement of his shoulders; this comes across as comfortable and friendly, which made the audience open to his policy statements, despite the fact that he is the youngest and the least statesman-like of the three.

David Cameron passed up his chance to dominate the proceedings, and his stance – with one leg forward and one back – demonstrated his ambivalence about joining in. He looked like he was about to enter the argument, but on many occasions he stepped back, as if wanting to avoid it. This restrained appearance fit with his shoulders, which were held very steady; this can communicate gravitas, but it came across as dignified but stiff. He was even more constrained at the end when Gordon Brown went into the crowd to shake hands; not only did Cameron attempt to remain on the stage, but he physically held Nick Clegg back, momentarily preventing Clegg from leaving the stage. On some occasions he was so removed that he tilted his head back and looked down his nose. Finally, there were many moments when he furrowed his brow, and when he made points by making his hand into a fist; this can come across as strong, but it can easily look angry.

Gordon Brown started with the most disadvantages, and he performed quite well given his well-known propensity for nervous tics. He generally looked determined and reliable, nodding his head once for each of his convictions. While still having a few unusual hand gestures (such as putting his hands together as in prayer), the camera angles minimised any hand issues for him. The only noticeable body language problem was that he often bent his neck rightward (a normal gesture), but he went too far, moving his right ear toward his shoulder as if he was still bent up inside. His body language handlers are to be congratulated for his many improvements since he took office, although some pundits have claimed that it was a bit too rehearsed; this can be particularly obvious when he holds his arms out with his hands facing his belly, as if he is hugging the audience – which is a clear reference to Tony Blair’s body language. Unfortunately, when he manages to land a rehearsed joke, such as the one about “airbrushed policies”, he still smirks.

The best moment of the encounter was when Gordon Brown claimed that he and Nick Clegg agreed, but Clegg immediately interrupted to say he did not agree. This demonstrated Clegg’s independence and that he was a genuine alternative in his own right. In their closing comments, both Clegg and Brown name-checked audience members who had asked questions. Clegg listed everyone who asked a question, but he was plainly reading from his notes; Brown only mentioned one audience member, the one who asked a particularly important question, but he plainly knew the name and was speaking without notes. Vox pops after the debate said that they thought Clegg’s name check of all the questioners worked very well; I guess it is a matter of taste.

The most important conclusion from the debates was that, despite the warnings of pundits, the public were able to pay attention for 90 minutes. There were no gaffes recognised during the debates themselves, although there may be some interesting fallout afterward as the candidates' statements are scrutinised. The basic structure of the debate meant that Nick Clegg was presented and accepted on an equal footing with the two main political parties, while previously he lacked the funding, public recognition, or media attention to compete with them. This caught Gordon Brown off guard, and in the future both Cameron and Brown are likely to give Clegg a much more thorough grilling. As a debate, the process was stilted at the beginning, but as the candidates warmed up, it became more natural, which suggests that after years of incumbents’ avoiding these American-style debates, they will become a regular feature of the British political landscape.

See other essays about body language.

Jonathan Kay, the world-renowned fool, gave an edgy solo performance on Saturday night at The Basement on Kensington St., as an inspirational addendum to his 2-day fooling workshop. From the moment he entered and ad-libbed Titanic's arm-spreading scene while getting the entire audience to sing the movie's theme song, nothing about theatre could be taken for granted. Even the price, which was a donation based on how much you liked what happened, forced you to think about money and theatre in a new way.

His knitted fool's cap with giant wings was the only rehearsed element to expose how this experimental theatre would turn into fooling. The stage was bare except for a wooden chair and a treasure chest-sized box, and these were the springboards for his improvised repertoire. He leaped, shuffled and rolled into an evening of riffing off the audience and playing every sort of character, from Little Red Riding Hood to a dead badger, in order to achieve a barrier-breaking audience experience.

I was in the minority of the audience that was not part of the fooling workshop, and the mood of the crowd was one of sharing and openness. He broke the ice by ad-libbing off his prop, pointing out that most of us live our lives in a safe little box. He primed us for the rest of his offering with the idea that you have to say "yes," because if you say "no" the performance stops and you have to start again. Audience members happily contributed to his anarchic imaginations, being singled out and answering questions. This was personal. There was a sense in which he wanted to know each of us. He even described the efforts he was making on stage as "giving love."

But it wasn't all happy clappy — there were perilous moments too. I was singled out by Kay despite keeping a low profile. He initially asked me to hum, and then he asked me my name. Then he started approaching me and asked if I wanted a kiss, one of the running gags of the evening. I replied in his own vernacular by simply humming, so he upped the ante by suggesting the entire audience would have to kiss me. Mercifully, he then let me off the hook by caricaturing how I would later congratulate myself for making such a big contribution to the evening by humming.

The moment that epitomized the truth that can emerge from all this fooling around came when a 20-year-old audience member told us that he had just dropped out. Kay suddenly burst into a crazy tableau of a man dropping out of the sky and another man on the ground trying to catch him. As the drop-out lay fallen on the ground, he reckoned his future plans were to drop out of dropping out, leading Kay to point out that this strategy was the first step on the road to becoming a fool. At that moment the running gags crossed the finish line.

My agent Sylvia Tidy-Harris just asked me to join Twitter, the telegraphically brief online social network. Brighton being the European digital media capital it is, I dutifully created a profile and made my first update. When you log in to Twitter, you see the photographs of the other twitterers you have chosen to follow next to their most recent updates. Since each update is limited to 140 characters, your eyes can quickly scan what everyone you care about is doing.

On the plus side, Sylvia says Twitter is free publicity. I am my own brand, and Twitter provides a business-like reflection of what I am doing without the friends, photos and party memorabilia that make Facebook such an obvious professional liability. Twitter also makes you feel more connected. After I started twittering, I was almost immediately found in California by a former bandmember from ages ago. I felt both heart-warmed and amazed, because I joined Twitter as an experiment and told none of my friends about it. Unfortunately, I learned nothing about Todd because he chose to remain mute on Twitter, watching others while guarding his own privacy.

This is the minus side. I think it takes a particular kind of person to broadcast about himself to the world. Even though I constantly give talks to students and to the public, my lectures are very interactive, almost like giant seminars. I like getting second-by-second feedback from the students' body language and from their answers to my questions. Also Twitter made me feel like I wasn’t trying hard enough. From following my agent's daily exploits, I learned that she is interviewed by the national media nearly every day, while my specialist opinions are sought once per week at most.

This I can rationalise. Because of confidentiality I cannot talk about my job at the medical school, which is what I spend most of my time doing. This means that the movie of my virtual life on Twitter-world has a stroboscopic effect where the snapshot moments of my public and business life are interrupted by vast and plentiful black spaces. Without the full narrative, there is no meaning. I am not really interested in the sound-bites, the name-checks and the unlabelled group photos decontextualized by the ADHD-styled national media.

Where does all this leave Twitter? Well, in amongst Twitter's banter and chatter, there are important events and cool places referenced, and it is all personalised to us, the end-users. My fellow consumers and I can learn about the people we know rather than the celebrities and villains that journalists have foisted upon us as neighbours in our dystopian global village. The problem is that none of it joins up the dots. As lovely as free publicity is, I don't expect to persist with Twitter. I just don't think that I can glean the meaning of what's going on in 140 characters or less. Maybe I should hire someone to do it for me. But then it wouldn't be free publicity.

When Tina Gonsalves, the Australian video-artist, spoke at the Lighthouse on Kensington Street in February, she invited me to visit her new home in Berlin. I was already scheduled to talk in Berlin later that month at an international drug safety meeting, so we did it. My plane arrived in the midst of a freak hail storm, but the German buses and U-bahn were unaffected, unlike their London counterparts. Tina, Matt and their son lived in a high ceiling flat in Friedrichshain right next to all the bars. I suddenly realised she lived on the coolest street, in the coolest district, in the coolest city in the world. And they owned it. Artists, eh?

Joking aside, Berlin's real estate is the most affordable you are going to find in any capital city in Western Europe. As a young city dating from the fall of the Wall, Berlin has none of the industry or money that shape Munich and Frankfurt; some parts of Berlin have unemployment exceeding 25 percent and serious problems with drugs and alcoholism. I aimed to see it.

So I went on a Pub Crawl offered by New Berlin Tours. This is what I yearned for when I arrived in Brighton: a late night being introduced to the city's bars and clubs in the company of friendly strangers. It started predictably enough, as I found myself at Zapata's talking to some young students from Doncaster. In the first bar I met the happy Norwegians, and I found people can still smoke inside some of the bars. Between bars we were provided with nasty pre-mixed shots of spirits to steel us against the cold. It ended up with dancing at Tresor, a club located in an old power station. This real estate was too mainstream.

So I joined the Alternative City Tour, which focuses on the graffiti and squats in Berlin; it is also run by New Berlin Tours. Our Californian guide's name was Summer, and she insisted A) it was her real name, and B) her parents were not hippies. She had a university degree in street art, but said she had never been to Brighton, although she had heard about our exquisite graffiti murals. By contrast, there is an ugly edge to Berlin's street art. There are crews competing, sometimes with violence, to jaggedly paint their names on the tops of tall buildings. There are a few appealing giant murals of the Brazil national soccer team, but these are betrayed by little white swishes from their sponsor. A lot of the graffiti is just territorial, like the man who paints hundreds of sixes all over town. There was tagging all over the swathes of fenced-off wasteland in the middle of this teeming city — remnants of the war — that reminded me of pre-lottery England under the Tories. Combined with the concrete architecture, much of Berlin comes across as a rough council estate. Lamentably, none of Banksy’s "public" artworks have survived in Berlin; they have all been stolen. What vandals!

I am currently writing a book about music, pleasure and the brain. The following blog records my thoughts and progress as I write.

The classic examples of territory in music that I have used are

• teenagers turning the music up after they slam the door
• Young men playing music very loudly out of their car window
• Hare Krishnas dancing to the Maha Mantra
• English Rugby crowd singing “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot”

Thus far, the way the book is written, the chapter that has the most explicit and complete discussion of the role of territory music is the chapter “Does violent music make people violent?” In that chapter I go into detail in various units in the US security use music to break the enemy. One of the most famous examples was on 28 February 1993 when the ATF (The US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms) attempted to break the siege of David Koresh’s followers, the Branch Davidians, in Waco Texas. They played very loud rock to break the spirit of the group, but they also played Tibetan chants so that the media could get some footage of how to (politely) break the will of a anti-government rebel. It did not work.