Be Careful Whom You Mirror, And When – How To Use Nonverbal Mirroring
Christopher Philip
According to new research, mirroring is adaptive and beneficial, except sometimes it’s not.
Lead researcher Rachelle Smith-Genthos, a psychologist at Texas Tech University and her colleagues looked at the nonverbal effect of mirroring voice qualities on perceptions of interview candidates for a mock job.
In one condition, the participants were either paired up with a “negative” interviewer who spoke in a cold, uninterested and bored tone of voice or one who spoke in a neutral tone.
As predicted the candidates who interacted with the negative interviewer matched that person’s tone of voice by also becoming colder, uninterested and less enthusiastic.
Upon replay, had both the candidate and their respective interviewer been seen in the same context, all might have seemed normal, however, the experimenters threw them a loop by stripping the audio out and presenting them to another set of participants. These participants then rated the “job candidates.”
Naturally, those recorded while interacting with the negative interviewer suffered when compared to those originating from the neutral interviewer. Since the lack of interest was transmitted onto the interviewee, they were presumed to be less enthusiastic about the job.
While in most one-on-one instances, mirroring can produce desirable results, this is one such instance where this is not so. One might fault technology saying that we aren’t wired in such a way as to maximize our fitness by being stripped out of context, however, the same effect might be apparent as an outsider looking in on any situation, even if we might find it more normal.
Regardless, however, we should be careful in such instances where we know that context might be nullified or modified such that we create more desirable impressions. This is worthy information for leadership candidates who are often interviewed by facing a camera with their answers stripped away for analysis and presentation. Should one fall victim of a negative interviewer, the outcome could be disastrous.
Contrary to previous research on mirroring behaviors, the chameleon effect did not reap a positive outcome in this study. There has been a great emphasis placed on the positive behaviors and outcomes of mimicry behavior, but the researchers have touched upon the circumstances and potential consequences of negative mimicry.
Resources
Smith-Genthôs, K. Rachelle; Darcy A. Reich; Jessica L. Lakin; Mario P. Casa de Calvo. The Tongue-Tied Chameleon: The Role of Nonconscious Mimicry in the Behavioral Confirmation Process. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. 2019. 56: 179-182.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022103114001541