People overestimate how much others notice their appearance or behavior.
Gilovich's 2000 study had students wear an embarrassing T-shirt and estimate how many observers noticed. They guessed about half; the actual figure was under a quarter.
In practice
- An employee who arrives with a shaving cut is aware of it all morning, and is asked about it by nobody.
- A speaker who stumbles over one sentence replays it for a week, and the audience recalls the argument.
- Further reading
- Wikipedia
- Subject
- Psychology & Behavior
- Essay
- A century and a half of measuring the mind