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.
