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User:KJamison7/Illusion of transparency

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A persons subjective experience is directly unobservable by anyone but themselves. They must be interpreted through facial expressions, gestures, sounds, senses, or by communication with the person. Psychologist Elizabeth Newton created a simple method to test this phenomena. She would tap out a song well known song, such as happy birthday or the national anthem, with her finger and have the test subject guess the song. It was estimated that the song would be guessed correctly in about 50% of the tests, but only 3% picked the correct song. While in her head, she could hear every note and the lyrics, the observer could only hear a rhythmic tapping and was unaware of what she was thinking.[1]

Public speaking and stage fright

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The Illusion of transparency is commonly prominent in public speakers. This can also be enhanced by the spotlight effect. Any insecurities or nervousness that the speaker feels about a speech, the speaker feels are over exaggerated and very obvious to the crowd. Studies have shown that when a survey of the crowd regarding the speaker was taken, the results showed that the speakers emotions were not nearly as evident to the crowd as it perceived by the speaker.[2] Initial anxiety can cause stress on a public speaker they might feel is evident to the listeners due to this phenomena. This can cause the speaker to compensate which he/she then feels is even more obvious to the crowd, and then they get more stressed. This forms a loop which can escalate to more stress. Knowledge and understanding of the illusion of transparency can help prevent this loop and avoid speech anxiety.

Kenneth Savitsky and Thomas Gilovich

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There are two studies done by these psychologists in this area on public speaking and anxiety. The first of which focused on how the speaker perceived their anxiety levels as opposed to how an observer perceived the speakers anxiety levels. The results were as expected and the speaker had judged himself harder than the observer did.

In their second study, they focused on the connection between the illusion of transparency and the exacerbation of speech anxiety. There were three focus groups in this study; control, reassured and informed. The informed group were reassured, the illusion of transparency was explained to them, and because of this phenomena, that there emotions are not as evident to the listeners as they think they thought. All were given a topic and had five minutes to prepare a speech in front of a crowd. After which they rated themselves on anxiety, speech quality and appearance. Observers also rated them on anxiety levels and speech quality. The informed group rated themselves higher in every aspect and were also rated higher by the observers. By believing that they had less anxiety and the speech was better in the informed group, than they had less stress and their speech tended to be better.

The Bystander effect

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Thomas Gilovich, Victoria Husted Medvec, and Kenneth Savitsky believed that this phenomena was partially the reason for the bystander effect. In their study's they thought that in a situation where an individual was concerned or alarmed that it would be easy to see. What they found was that their expressions were not as obvious as the individual thought, and that the individual believed that they would be able to read others expressions better than they actually could[3].

“When confronted with a potential emergency, people typically play it cool, adopt a look of nonchalance, and monitor the reactions of others to determine if a crisis is really at hand. No one wants to overreact, after all, if it might not be a true emergency. However, because each individual holds back, looks nonchalant, and monitors the reactions of others, sometimes everyone concludes (perhaps erroneously) that the situation is not an emergency and hence does not require intervention.”

— Thomas Gilovich, Victoria Husted Medvec, and Kenneth Savitsky, Journal of Personal and Social Psychology, Vol. 75, No. 2

See Also

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Further Reading

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References

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  1. ^ McRaney, David (14 July 2010). "The Illusion of Transparency". Retrieved 20 July 2011.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: date and year (link)
  2. ^ "The illusion of transparency and the alleviation of speech anxiety" (PDF). Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. 39. 25 March 2003. Retrieved 20 July 2011. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)CS1 maint: date and year (link)
  3. ^ "The Illusion of Transparency: Biased Assessments of Others' Ability to Read One's Emotional States". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 75 (2): 332–346. 1998. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.75.2.332. PMID 9731312. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
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