Are we as good as we think? Observers' perceptions of indirect self‐presentation as a social influence tactic

Abstract

Three studies tested whether indirect self‐presentation actually works as a social influence tactic in the eyes of other people—as prior research has shown that it works for the self—and, if so, whether it works to the same degree for others as it does for the self. Experiment 1 demonstrated that basking in reflected glory, an association with a positively viewed entity, did improve an audience's perceptions of the basker. Experiment 2 demonstrated that if the audience's view of the basking target changed, an identical basking strategy backfired and was perceived negatively by the audience. Experiment 3 further examined potential self–other differences in the effectiveness of indirect self‐presentation using a purportedly shared birthday association while directly comparing an observer's views to self‐views. The birthday association did change the observer's view but to a lesser degree than it changed the person's self‐views, suggesting a self–other asymmetry. Portions of this research are based on Seth Carter's Masters Thesis conducted under the direction of Lawrence Sanna. We thank thesis committee members Bruce Bartholow and Hart Blanton, Editor Anthony Pratkanis and anonymous reviewers, and the Imagination, Goals, and Affect (IGoA, or ego) laboratory group members at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for their comments on this research. We also thank Michael Pote and Ryan Campbell for assistance with the data collection and coding.