The illusion of transparency: Biased assessments of others' ability to read one's emotional states.

Abstract

Three sets of studies provide evidence for an illusion of transparency, or a tendency for people to overestimate the extent to which others can discern their internal states. People often mistakenly believe that their internal states "leak out" more than they really do. The authors attribute this bias to a tendency for people to adjust insufficiently from the "anchor" of their own phenomenological experience when attempting to take another's perspective. Evidence for this illusion is provided by showing that liars overestimate the detectability of their lies (Studies la, lb, and lc) and that people believe their feelings of disgust are more apparent than they actually are (Studies 2a and 2b). A final pair of experiments (Studies 3a and 3b) explores the implications of the illusion of transparency for people's reluctance to intervene in emergencies. All 3 sets of studies also provide evidence consistent with the proposed anchoring and adjustment interpretation. Fans of Edgar Allan Poe will recall that the key passage in The TellTale Heart is one in which the protagonist does his best to play it cool during a conversation with three police officers. It is a performance made more difficult by the fact that the officers happen to be standing directly above the hidden body of the protagonist's murder victim. As he becomes increasingly anxious that the officers suspect his guilt, he begins to hear what he takes to be his victim's heart beating underneath the floorboards. He becomes convinced that the sound, which in reality is the beating of his own heart, can be heard by the officers as well. Eventually, his emotions get the best of him and he gives himself away:

Why People Waive Their Miranda Rights: The Power of Innocence.

“…Conceptually, this effect may reflect a special instance of a generalized, and perhaps motivated, belief in a just world in which human beings "get what they deserve" and "deserve what they get" (Lerner, 1980). The effect may also be viewed as symptomatic of an "illusion of transparency," a tendency for people to overestimate the extent to which their own thoughts, emotions, and other inner states are detectable and knowable by others (Gilovich, Savitsky, & Medvec, 1998;Miller & McFarland, 1987). This illusion was evident in a recent study in which mock suspects erroneously assumed that their guilt or innocence would be judged accurately by the interrogator-and by others who would observe their denials (Kassin & Fong, 1999).…”

Detecting deception via strategic disclosure of evidence.

“…Innocence seems to be accompanied by a number of general beliefs and expectations. For example, it has been demonstrated that people believe that internal states leave visible traces on the outside (Gilovich, Savitsky, & Medvec, 1998;Savitsky & Gilovich, 2003;Vorauer & Claude, 1998). It may be that innocent suspects provide the truth without holding information back, because they believe that innocence is visible, and by acting in line with one's innocence, one will be judged correctly.…”

10. The relation between language and theory of mind in development and evolution

“…that holistically expressed person-object relations and perhaps included interjections to clarify such person-object relations (e.g., a prehistoric "oops" to indicate unintentionality or an ancient "there" to indicate intentionality; see Carpenter, Akhtar, & Tomasello, 1998). Add to that the fact that even in modern times communicators overestimate the clarity of their expressions and the transparency of their communicative intentions (Gilovich, Savitsky, & Medvec, 1998;Keysar, 1994). We can conclude, then, that protolanguage posed serious difficulties for the ancient social perceiver and may have caused a fair amount of misunderstanding and conflict within and between groups.…”