Communication Assumptions

I am not a big television watcher so finding an unknown show was not difficult. I do like to laugh so I picked New Girl for this activity.
     When I watched the show without any sound I felt the relationship with the characters was a positive one in which they seemed to support each other. I came to this assumption because there were many examples of characters speaking with each other with eye contact and smiles. There were many feelings expressed mainly through the facial expressions of the characters. As I stated, there was eye contact which says honesty to me. When a more sensitive discussion seemed to be going on the head of the listener would tilt just a bit to display concern. Most of the time both speakers and listeners had their arms down and not crossed. There was one point in the show in which the "coach" who works in a fitness gym was in the face of a woman screaming and she was crying. When I listened to the show with sound he was screaming, "I am trying to help you!" I never would have guessed that without the words. Most of the feeling expressed during this show was concern for the "new girl" who was having a rough time in a break up which had happened at the beginning of the show.
     I did make some assumptions through the nonverbal communication that were incorrect. At one point in the show, one of the characters was speaking to his friends and ended up pulling his sweat shirt hood over his face. I thought it meant he wasn"t listening to the conversation, but what it truly meant was when he did not want confrontation or to make a deciding choice he "hooded" the speaker so he would not have to reply. (I am not sure if that made sense the way I wrote it). Also, during the first viewing I thought a conversation between one of the male characters and the woman demonstrated his feelings for the woman, in the way he looked at her. When I listened to that same segment he was actually talking about an old girlfriend he still has feelings for and that is why his facial expressions were showing compassion.
     This was a revealing exercise for me because it showed me things may sometimes not be what I think simply by listening to the words being said BUT we need the words as well. I wonder how the exercise would go if we listened without the visual, how that would turn out? I think my "aha" moment has been developing for the last year or so. The way I perceive body language is not necessarily  how another would. I have to be very careful to "listen" to what others are saying in their whole body as well as "watch" what I am saying with mine. If someone I am talking to is not hearing my words or does not understand the English language then what am I saying to them nonverbally?