LifeFind out in 30 seconds: Why first impressions most often cannot be trusted

Useful tips

To make a good first impression, you need the right approach

– remember, you will only have one try.

Failure means that your level of trust will drop significantly. Moreover, the interlocutor may be disappointed in you, which means it will be difficult to hope for his help.

When you have a chance, you shouldn't miss it.

But making a first impression is not the easiest thing. In the end, all people are different and everyone looks for different qualities in their interlocutors.

Besides, many people are nervous

when meeting someone new for the first time, especially if it is a person who can influence your destiny or a serious situation in your life.

Be open

Candid, personal stories about yourself will help win over a person and gain trust. This method helps you quickly get closer to your interlocutor. But it is important not to overdo it and pour out your whole soul at once; do it gradually. Perhaps the person will also want to share something personal in response and thereby support you.

Use simple ways to make a good impression on strangers and expand your social circle. You will find even more useful and exciting information on the website. The platform hosts more than 100 online courses and webinars, a catalog of current professions and various tests, competitions and events. You will definitely find useful tools for yourself.

How to make a good first impression

Whenever you meet someone, it is extremely important to make a good impression on your interlocutor, because, as you know, it is very difficult to change. Success in your personal life and professional activities depends on this. In this article we will look at several rules that will help you get in touch with a new person and leave a good impression.

There is a so-called first impression effect. This is an opinion about a person that the subject formed in the first minutes of the meeting and influences the further assessment of his activities and personality. When you are in a company unfamiliar to you, you involuntarily pay attention to someone who confidently holds and speaks, who controls his emotions and body. This behavior evokes respect and a desire to engage in conversation with him.

The first impression depends on the following factors:

  • The ability to control the body - gestures, gaze, gait, posture, facial expressions.
  • Voice and intonation - timbre, confidence in the voice or excitement.
  • The meaning of spoken words. This factor matters not in the first minutes of acquaintance, but after some time.

There are several rules that must be followed.

1

Don't try to make a good impression

Yes exactly. Things don't go as planned when you're trying to make a good impression. You won't be able to relax because instead of maintaining a pleasant conversation, you'll be thinking about how not to lose face. You will stop paying attention to your interlocutor if you are absorbed in yourself, your reactions, facial expressions, gestures and behavior.

2

Be yourself

Perhaps the most significant impression of another person is something like “He was himself.” Of course, this does not negate the fact that you need to learn communication skills and techniques and develop in order to become even better.

Hypocrisy is noticed by people instantly, even if they cannot explain it in words. The interlocutor will feel awkward if your words are at odds with your demeanor or if your sad mood is combined with a forced smile. In the latter case, you need to learn to cheer yourself up.

Not every event you are invited to is worth going to if you feel uncomfortable there. Being present in order to please people is not entirely correct, because hypocrisy is inherent in this very action. Go to events that you enjoy, because there you can be yourself.

3

Learn to enjoy communication

Everything can go wrong if you don't like people and communicating with them. What to do? Study psychology, learn to find internal motivation, because first of all you need it. As already mentioned, people sense falsehood and hypocrisy, so you need to learn not to fake emotions, but to actually experience them. Be friendlier, more smiling, more cheerful.

Social media has created a lot of introverts, to fix this, work on yourself. After some time, you will realize that you enjoy the process of communication and understanding people. Learn to listen and tell interesting stories.

If you truly enjoy communication, everything will work out on its own. You will no longer need to artificially try to make a good impression; it will be formed without your participation. However, this requires a lot of work on yourself.

4

See yourself through other people's eyes

This does not mean that you should be able to show good sides that are not really there. You just need to make sure that the person perceives you as real. Many can probably remember a situation when they did not mean at all what was perceived. Our words and facial expressions in these seconds may not be combined, so the interlocutor may misunderstand you.

Think about what kind of person other people see you as. If you consider yourself cheerful, but others do not, then how can you make them see you as the life of the party and a positive person? How to bring internal and external factors into harmony? How to learn to dress in such a way that it fully corresponds to your opinion about yourself? When you answer all these questions, you will begin to understand how you look in the eyes of other people and there will no longer be a situation in which you are misunderstood and misjudged.

5

Think about why people should communicate with you

This is also quite natural. People value those who are interesting to them. And if, when you meet someone, you don’t even understand how to win over and how to attract a person, difficulties begin. Thinking about what you can give to other people does not make you a hypocrite. This allows you to at least sometimes stop being selfish and not demand good treatment from scratch.

People appreciate unobtrusiveness, friendly disposition, and a sense of humor. They do not like to argue (although they do argue), and they cannot stand criticism that hurts their pride. These moments are only intensified when it comes to dating. Therefore, thinking about the comfort of your interlocutor is a completely normal process and this is what it means to be able to communicate with people. Don’t wait for the moment when your interlocutor himself offers you an interesting topic - offer it yourself.

What ways do you know to make a good first impression? Share it with us in the comments.

We also recommend reading:

  • Storytelling
  • Impression
  • 6 Effective Communication Techniques
  • Good books for self-education
  • Preparing and delivering a speech
  • How to Meet Anyone at Social Events
  • Negative social habits
  • Secrets of charisma during public speaking (part 2)
  • Stages of team formation according to Tuckman
  • How to leave a good first impression. Secrets of Leila Lowndes
  • How to find the best employees

Key words:1Profiling

Leadership

Albert E. Mannes from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania found that bald men are considered dominant and are perceived as leaders who can successfully lead a team.

The scientist conducted a series of experiments. During one of them, he showed photographs of men with and without hair. The people in the photo were the same age and wearing the same clothes. Volunteers had to look at the pictures and say which of the men was stronger morally and physically. The palm went to the bald ones.

Potential

In 2011, Canadian researchers came to the following conclusion: in the eyes of others, men who prefer a classic business suit achieve fame, money and success faster than adherents of a casual style.

Participants in the experiment were shown photographs of models. Some of them were in elegant suits, while others were in simple everyday clothes. Volunteers were asked to predict who the people in the photo would work as and what fate awaited them. As a result, men in jeans and sweaters were assigned lower wages and positions, even if they sat in leather chairs in posh offices. On the contrary, people in formal suits were judged as “kings of life”: they will have a lot of money, they will quickly achieve success.

Intelligence and promiscuity

The ability to look your interlocutor in the eyes speaks of a person with high intelligence. This is how others perceive us. If at the first meeting a person averts his eyes, then, most likely, an opinion will be formed about him as a person with a narrow mind.

The first impression is deceiving. For example, glasses with discreet frames will create the impression that this is an educated person. Although wearing glasses has nothing to do with IQ level.

To create the impression of an educated person, you need to look your interlocutor in the eyes when speaking.

Scientists in England conducted an experiment among men. They were given photographs that showed women with tattoos on various parts of their bodies and no designs on their bodies. The assessment was carried out according to three parameters:

  • alcohol consumption;
  • attractiveness;
  • moral qualities.

Based on the test, scientists concluded that women who have tattoos on open parts of the body are perceived by men as lovers of alcoholic beverages and leading an immoral life.

Punctuality

Back in the seventeenth century, Louis XIV said: “ Accuracy is the courtesy of kings and the duty of all good people!” “In fact, this statement formed the basis for the rapid development of etiquette in Europe.

To this day, time is considered the most valuable resource. Therefore, you should plan your day and upcoming routes in advance in order to get everything done on time.

Probing the soil

Let's return to the kings. It's no secret that the most successful monarchs were also strategists. None of them sent their army to foreign lands to conquer them without reconnaissance. Why are we worse than kings?

It definitely wouldn’t hurt to make inquiries about the location and participants of the upcoming meeting.

For example, an interview. History of the company, specifics of activity, top officials. All this information will help avoid stalemate situations. Job seekers like to ask the question: “What do you already know about our company?” An awkward silence or a vague answer will significantly damage the opinion of the applicant. While awareness will clearly play into your hands.

Or meeting the family of your future husband. You should know the full names in advance. So as not to confuse anything out of excitement. Food preferences.

It would be inappropriate to bring meatloaf to the table in a vegetarian family.

Effects of perception

There are such unique features that form the first opinion as:

  • Boomerang - we strive to resist the pressure of another if we feel it. It is because of this that disputes often arise that spoil the entire image of the interlocutor.
  • The primacy effect concerns new information about an acquaintance; we strive to find out the latest news, even if it radically diverges from the general opinion.
  • Stereotyping arises if, even before we met, we heard about a person from his other acquaintances.

There are other features, such as projection or labeling. They must be dealt with in any case.

Social status

A study by Dutch scientists showed that people use clothing as a social marker that determines an individual's position in society and income level. When a person wears Tommy Hilfiger, Lacoste or other famous brands, others think that he has a high position.

In one experiment, participants were shown videos of interviews of applicants for a laboratory assistant position at a university. Some applicants were wearing simple white shirts, while others were wearing clearly branded shirts. But everyone's actions and speech were identical. Each volunteer was shown only one video, after watching which he had to rate on a seven-point scale how worthy this or that applicant is of the position and what his social status is. The social status of applicants wearing designer clothes was rated higher, as were their chances of getting a job.

The authors of the study note that designer clothing did not affect the assessment of other qualities - reliability, kindness, and others. Only status.

Thin sections

This term was coined in 1992 by psychologists Nalini Ambady and Robert Rosenthal.
They used it to study the phenomenon of first impression and social intuition. According to the hypothesis, a person's nonverbal behavior can tell a lot about him. To test this assumption, the scientists recorded 10-second silent videos of Harvard professors giving lectures. The video was shown to people unfamiliar with the teachers and they were asked to rate the speakers using 15 parameters (“thin slices”). Volunteers judged how active the lecturers were, confident, sincere, and so on.

Then the experiment was repeated, but 5-second videos were shown to another group of viewers. Surprisingly, the thin sections in both cases were almost identical. The scientists went further: the timing was reduced to 2 seconds, and the participants in the experiment were again updated. The result was repeated.

After this, the researchers asked students to characterize teachers who attend their lectures and have known them for more than one semester. And here lay the main surprise.

Thin sections among students and outside observers who evaluated teachers only on short “silent” videos were almost identical. This allowed us to summarize:

People make conclusions about those they see for the first time very quickly, literally within the first 2 seconds of communication. Moreover, their judgment has nothing to do with what the person says.

Let's find out what thin slices people make about us in the first seconds of meeting us.

The influence of aromas

A person smells another person, perfume, the aroma of skin. The impression can be created based on smells and evoke associations. If they are pleasant, then the person will like you at the first meeting. This happens unconsciously. People who have a similar skin odor are more likely to hit it off when they first meet.

The first impression can be deceptive; subsequent communication may reveal that the person is rude, arrogant, and it is difficult to continue communicating with him. The first impression is created due to the qualities that the stranger is ready to show to others.

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Sexual orientation

Nalini Ambady and Nicholas Rule conducted a study and found that a man's sexual orientation can be determined in 50 milliseconds.

Volunteers were shown photographs of men (hetero and homo) from dating sites in random order for different time intervals. With 50 milliseconds of visual contact with a photo, the accuracy of sexual orientation judgments was 62%.

Approximately the same results were obtained in a study of the likelihood of identifying women's sexual identity based on their faces (Rule, Ambady, & Hallett, 2009). Moreover, this required even less time - 0.04 seconds.

Pay attention to yourself

Focus on yourself and your feelings shortly before your first meeting with someone new to you. This can be any method that is closest to you that helps you meet your inner “I” and feel balance: a short meditation, prayer, or simply remembering a moment when you felt especially happy or very calm.

“Such visual images that we evoke in our imagination set us up for a wave of openness and trust in the world, giving us self-confidence. People tend to feel this sense of internal balance in the interlocutor and involuntarily begin to feel sympathy for him as a harmonious person,” says Thomas Plaint, a professor of psychology and psychiatry at Santa Clara University.

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