Egocentrism, The Spotlight Effect, and the Illusion of Transparency

这个项目考察了人们如何看待别人的心理过程。该研究特别研究了两种自我中心偏见，这两种偏见是由于难以超越自己的经验或观点而产生的。“聚光灯效应”指的是一种假设倾向，即人们会高估别人对自己的关注程度。因此，人们倾向于相信（通常是错误的）“所有的眼睛都在盯着他们”。“透明错觉”指的是一种假设的倾向，即人们会高估自己的内心状态被他人察觉的程度。因此，人们倾向于相信（同样，通常是错误的）别人不能看穿他们。“这项拟议中的研究有三个目标：1)检验这两种偏见在日常社会生活中的普遍性；2)检验这些偏差是否主要来自共同的“锚定-调整”启发式，还是来自人们在根据自己的经验锚定进行充分调整时遇到的困难；3)检验这些偏差在各种应用环境中的重要性。如果能更好地理解聚光灯效应和透明错觉，就能解释社交恐惧症、破坏性的“保全面子”手势和对“丢脸”的反应、青少年焦虑和从众、非最佳讨价还价和谈判、婚姻和谐与不和谐等多种现象。

This project examines the psychological processes that govern how people think they are viewed by others. In particular, the research examines two egocentric biases that result from the difficulty of getting beyond one's own experience or perspective. The `spotlight effect` refers to a hypothesized tendency for people to overestimate the extent to which others attend to them. Thus, people tend to believe (often erroneously) that `all eyes are upon them.` The `illusion of transparency` refers to a hypothesized tendency for people to overestimate the extent to which their internal states are detectable by others. Thus, people tend to believe (again, often erroneously) that others can `see right through them.` The proposed research has three objectives: 1) to examine the pervasiveness of these two biases in everyday social life; 2) to test whether these biases stem primarily from a common `anchoring-and-adjustment` heuristic, or from the difficulty people have in adjusting sufficiently from the anchor of their own experience; 3) to examine the significance of these biases in a variety of applied contexts. A better understanding of the spotlight effect and illusion of transparency should shed light on such diverse phenomena as social phobia, destructive `face saving` gestures and reactions to `losing face,` adolescent anxiety and conformity, non-optimal bargaining and negotiation, and marital harmony and discord.