People like you more than you think: New studies say self doubt can take a seat

It's estimated that social anxiety affects 12 percent of the Canadian population, but we've all been susceptible to the daily anxiety that meeting new people can bring. Having to introduce yourself and make initial small talk can always feel more harrowing than it should be and, more often than not, we can walk away regretting things we said or basically assuming everyone we just met hates us. While we'd all love to make a sterling first impression, a new series of studies suggests that we're all being way too hard on ourselves — people like us more than we think.

The studies, published in Psychological Science from researchers at Cornell, Harvard, Yale and the University Of Essex, aimed to examine the perceptions of people in first-time encounters. The first study paired 34 university students, who had never met before, and asked them to make five minutes of small talk, with ice-breaking suggestions provided. When the time was up, each student rated the conversation and their partner, and also estimated what their partner rated them. On average, participants estimated that their partners rated them noticeably lower than they actually did, a trend that was strongest amongst individuals that rated themselves as shy.

The second study aimed to track participants' thoughts while going through a similar situation. 84 new students were paired up and asked to talk about whatever they wanted. Participants reported that during the conversation, their own thoughts about what their partner might be thinking about them were stronger and more negative than what they themselves thought about said partner. Researchers dubbed this continued discrepancy between self-estimation and actual perceptions the "liking gap".

To test this gap in longer form, a third study found that the liking gap remained in conversations from two up to 45 minutes and that there was also an "enjoyment gap", regarding self-perceived and actual ratings of how much the partners liked the conversations. The fourth and fifth studies replicated experiments in real life settings — at an entrepreneurial workshop (where they found similar trends) and among first-year dormitory roommates. Among pairs of roommates, researchers tested them at intervals from the beginning of the semester in September, to the end of it in May. The liking gap held true for all intervals except the final one, demonstrating that this dissonance can last well into a newer friendship.

Though the sample sizes were relatively small and there was a heavy reliance on university students (for whom likability might be a higher priority), the prevailing existence of the liking gap is certainly one that bears consideration and further exploration, especially with regards to how it functions. While it's easy to see how some anxiety and self-scrutiny can work its way into our social lives, researchers suggest the reasoning for subjects judging themselves so harshly might be in order to adapt and improve. We are always trying to present the best version of ourselves to others and that's even more true with first impressions — which can have lasting effects even if just based on online images as with online dating, for example. Thus, our estimations of what others think of us is moreso a projection of how harshly we judge ourselves, as a way to both be hyper-self aware of what we're presenting and a motivation to improve upon it.

We are so preoccupied with this self-reflective thinking that we may be ignorant of what's actually going on — an analysis of the first study found that participants were not picking up on their partner's body language cues that indicated interest in the conversation. The further irony here is that previous research has shown that talking to strangers can actually be a mood booster, for both introverts and extroverts, increasing happiness and the sense of belonging. That may be because, when meeting a complete stranger, we have little to no expectations and are more curious than judgemental. However, when we think of what that stranger must be thinking of us, we insert our own inherent comparisons and harsh judgements of ourselves, to conclude that they think less of us than they actually do.

There is plenty of advice on how to make a great first impression (whether it be for dating, job interviews and even in your home), but it's of the essence to be aware of our potential for self-sabotage. People's actual opinions of us, for what they're worth, might not serve us if we can't shake our own negative self-perceptions. While it's certainly important to put our best foot forward, taking a moment to relax our own perspectives could go a long way to making our expectations a lot more realistic. First impressions can be more positive than our minds allow us to believe, and even if they're not, that stranger is probably too occupied with what you think of them to even realize.