Social Engineering Blogs

An Aggregator for Blogs About Social Engineering and Related Fields

Sometimes Similarities Mean More When it Comes to Persuasion

Imagine this scene on a busy street in New York City. Two guys are walking toward each other and the following ensues:Guy 1 – Hey man, I’m from New York! Are you?Guy 2 – F%#@ you buddy. I’m from Brooklyn!Trying to connect with someone based on what you have in common – similarities – is an effective way to engage the principleof liking … most of the time.All kidding aside, trying to connect with a New Yorker in the city over the fact that you’re a New Yorker too has little meaning. That’s so, because virtually everyone else on the street could say the same thing. There’s nothing unique or different about that to bond over. However, connecting over the fact that you’re both from NYC if you were somewhere else, say California, would mean something because it’s not likely too many others could say the same thing.This came to mind recently when I thought back to a time when Jane and I were in Boston. The year was 2004 and I’d qualified to run the Boston Marathon. Never having been to Boston we decided to fly in a few days early to enjoy the city and see the sites. One site we wanted to see was the bar Cheers, the location of the famous sitcom by the same name.As you might imagine, when we arrived the bar was packed with other curious tourists. In fact it was so crowded we couldn’t get a seat near the bar. After a short while Jane said to me, “I think those people are from Southwest Pennsylvania.” She could hear a couple talking and recognized the accent because that’s where she’s from originally.Shortly thereafter Jane said, “Excuse me. I wasn’t eavesdropping but are you from Southwest Pennsylvania?” They said they were and Jane proceeded to tell them she recognized their accent because she was from Waynesburg, Pa. A conversation ensued and soon we were sitting with this couple. If you didn’t know any better you’d have thought we knew each other and were good friends.As I shared at the beginning, trying to connect on the Southwest Pennsylvania similarity would not have meant much if Jane had brought it up in Southwest Pennsylvania. However, doing so in an unfamiliar environment magnifies similarities. Strangers in a strange city feel a sense of comfort meeting people they see as similar to themselves.What does this mean for you? To build or strengthen relationships you want to look for opportunities to connect using the principle of liking. Quite often you’ll find yourself in new or unfamiliar situations so connecting on similarities will be immensely helpful. Here are some tips:If you know some people who will be in attendance at an event you’re attending, Google them to learn about them in advance. Next, make it a point to connect on anything you have in common.If you don’t know who will be attending then you want to ask good questions and demonstrate active listening skills. Here are seven non-threating, ice-breaking inquiries you might want to use:What do you do for a living?Where are you from originally?Where did you go to school?Where do you live currently?Tell me about your family.What are some of your hobbies?What’s the most interesting place you’ve traveled to?Two things will happen when you ask these questions and actively listen. First, people appreciate the sincere interest and chance to talk about themselves. Second, you learn what you have in common and can then go deeper to form connections.Sometimes similarities mean more when it comes to persuasion. Recognizing that can help you magnify the liking principle which will help you build relationships and ultimately make it easier to hear “Yes” when you need someone to help you.Brian Ahearn, CMCT® Chief Influence Officer influencePEOPLE Helping You Learn to Hear “Yes”.

It Pays to be able to Read Emotions, Literally.

7-2-2014 2-44-38 PMA recent study out of Germany suggests that one’s ability to read emotions in others may have a direct correlation to how much you earn.

In a study published in the Journal of Organizational Behavior, researchers looked at emotion recognition ability and tested and measured it along with other interpersonal skills such as how socially astute they were, their networking savvy and how seemingly trustworthy they were in 142 German workers.

High emotional recognition was linked to a higher salary, even after controlling for salary-bumping factors like age, gender, education, work experience and work hours.

“This very basic ability has effects on the interpersonal facilitation facet of job performance and, most notably, even on annual income, an objective indicator of career success,” the study authors wrote. “The better people are at recognizing emotions, the better they handle the politics in organizations and the interpersonal aspects of work life, and thus the more they earn in their jobs.”

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The History of Microexpressions

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A microexpression is a brief involuntary expression of emotion.  They usually occur when an individual experiences a strong emotion but tries to conceal his/her feelings.  They may also occur because a person experiences multiple emotions in rapid succession.  Unlike normal facial expressions, it is difficult to voluntary produce or neutralize microexpressions.  They can express any of the seven emotions universally expressed in the face:  disgust, anger, fear, happiness, sadness, surprise and contempt.  They can occur as fast as 1/15th to 1/30th of a second.

The History:

Microexpressions were first discovered by Haggard and Isaacs (1966).  In their study, Haggard and Isaacs outlined how they discovered these “micromomentary” expressions while scanning motion picture films of psychotherapy hours, searching for indications of non-verbal communication between patient and therapist.

At around the same time, Condon and Ogston (1967) pioneered the study of interactions at the fraction-of-a-second level.  In Condon’s famous research project, he scrutinized a four-and-a-half hour film segment frame by frame, where each frame represented 1/25th of a second.  After studying this film segment for a year and a half, he discerned interactional micromovements, such as the wife moving her shoulder exactly as the husband’s hands came up, which combined yielded microrhythms.  Condon’s work, however, did not focus on facial expressions.

Subsequently, Ekman and Friesen (1969, 1974) included the concept of microexpressions in their studies of deception.  The results of this work were reported in the book Telling Lies (Ekman, 1985), and were popularized in the mass media through the television series Lie To Me.  They also play a central role in Robert Ludlum’s posthumously published The Ambler Warning, in which the central character, Harrison Ambler, is an intelligence agent who is able to see them [microexpressions].  Similarly, one of the main characters in Alastair Reynolds’ science fiction novel Absolution Gap, Aura, can easily read microexpressons.  On Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Detective Robert Goren was adept in detecting microexpressions.

Although the existence of microexpressons was reported in the 1960′s, the first report published in a peer-reviewed, scientific article validating their existence was Porter and ten Brinke (2008).  And, the first report published in a peer-reviewed, scientific article about tests of the ability to recognize microexpressions was Matsumoto et  al.’s (2000).

Some studies have indicated that the ability to read microexpressions is indeed related to the ability to detect deception; ironically, the most recent studies suggest that the ability to read subtle expressions (expressions of low intensity), not microexpressions, are better related to the ability to detect deceit.

References Cited:

Condon, W., S,, & Ogston, W. D. (1967). A segmentation of behavior. Journal of Psychiatric Research, 5, 221-235.

Ekman, P., & Friesen, W. V. (1969). The repertoire of nonverbal behavior: Categories, origins, usage, and coding.     Semiotica, 1, 49-98.

Ekman, P., & Friesen, W. V. (1974). Nonverbal behavior and psychopathology. In R. J. Friedman & M. Katz (Eds.), The psychology of depression: Contemporary theory and research (pp. 3-31). Washington, D. C.: Winston and Sons.

Haggard, E. A., & Isaacs, K. S. (1966). Micro-momentary facial expressions as indicators of ego mechanisms in psychotherapy. In L. A. Gottschalk & A. H. Auerbach (Eds.), Methods of Research in Psychotherapy (pp. 154-165). New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.

Matsumoto, D., LeRoux, J. A., Wilson-Cohn, C., Raroque, J., Kooken, K., Ekman, P., . . . Goh, A. (2000). A new test to measure emotion recognition ability: Matsumoto and Ekman’s Japanese and Caucasian Brief Affect Recognition Test (JACBART). Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 24(3), 179-209.

Porter, S., & ten Brinke, L. (2008). Reading between the lies: Identifying concealed and falsified emotions in universal facial expressions. Psychological Science, 19(5), 508-514.