What role does likability play? - Chapter 5

How does the Tupperware party exemplify the importance of likability?

It should come as no surprise that another social rule states that we are more likely to comply with a request if the requester is somebody we like and know. However, this rule is often exploited by professionals we are hardly familiar with and who we would certainly dislike if we were to know about their tricks. The best example to start with is the Tupperware party, which includes several other compliance techniques that we encountered in previous chapters: reciprocity, by beginning with a game in which every contestant wins a prize in the end; commitment, by having each member of the party describe the advantages of the products they already have at home; social proof, resulting from the behavior within the group (everybody buys, so it must be appropriate to do so).

Although certainly helpful, these factors don’t account for the real power of the Tupperware party, which comes from the rule of liking. The company’s trick is the setting, since the parties are always held by one friend of the group which is granted a percentage of each purchase at the event. Therefore, the customers have the feeling of buying the products not from a stranger, but from someone they know and like: the person who has arranged for the party. As Franzen and Davis (1990) have shown, this social bond is so strong that it is twice as likely to determine the purchase of a product as the customer’s preference for the object itself. Interestingly, the Tupperware company has expanded (a party is estimated to start every 2.7 seconds) and long entered the market in societies like Europe, Latin America, and Asia, which rely more on an individual’s place in a social network than in the USA. Consequently, less than 25% of the company’s sales now come from North America.

Similarly to the findings on social proof, the customers are well aware of the pressure resulting from the liking rule. Furthermore, the presence of the friend is not even necessary to elicit the desired behavior, mentioning the name is often sufficient. This is why the Shaklee Corporation (door-to-door sales) uses an endless-chain method to generate new sales: if a customer likes a product, he or she can be asked for the names of family members or friends who could be interested as well. Asking these new customers to buy the Shaklee products and to provide a list with friends generates an endless chain of potential sales.

Of course, in some instances this technique is not applicable. In these cases, professionals can try to press for compliance by getting the customer to like them. Several reliable factors have been identified that cause liking.

What are some factors that cause likability?

One of the most obvious factors is physical attractiveness. It is a widely known fact that beautiful people are often treated superior; however, the power of this aspect is its automaticity. People tend to be unaware of the impact that attractiveness has on their behavior. A good example for this is the so called halo effect, stating that only one positive characteristic (in this case physical attractiveness) determines the way a person is perceived by others (i.e. it dominates the perception). Studies (e.g. Langlois et al., 2000) have shown that, as a result of the halo effect, we automatically attribute such positive traits as honesty, intelligence, talent, and kindness to people we see as good-looking. This even has an effect on politics, as elections for Canadian federal statesmen show: > 2.5 more votes were cast for attractive candidates than for their unattractive competitors. The same findings can be applied to other settings: employment, where good-looking employees earn 12% to 14% more than their less beautiful counterparts; the legal system, where the likelihood of avoiding jail sentences was twice as high for attractive defendants than for unattractive ones. Furthermore, being good-looking increases the chance of receiving help when needed and to change other’s opinions. Interestingly, both males and females were prone to this influence, even when applied to their members of their own sex. Logically, this rule is out of effect when it comes to competitions (e.g. in the context of romantic relationships). What is more, even the attractiveness of children seems to influence us. Adults have been shown to rate an act of aggression as less severe when it was inflicted by an attractive child (see Dion, 1972) and good-looking pupils are perceived as more intelligent by teachers than their less pretty classmates (Ritts, Patterson, & Tubbs, 1992).

Another factor that causes liking is similarity, especially in the sense of opinions, personality traits, background, and lifestyle. The way we dress determines whether we  will receive help for example. Emswiller, Deaux, & Willits (1971) showed that experimenters dressing in a “hippie” fashion received the dime they asked for in more than 2/3 of the cases than when they asked a more conventionally dressed person (less than 1/2 of cases when not  conventionally dressed). The same was true for another condition that used “straight” fashion. In a same way, car dealers look for evidence of a potential customer’s background to claim they are like them. Furthermore, analyses of insurance contracts have shown that customers were more likely to purchase insurance from a salesperson that was similar to them concerning age, religion, political position, and smoking habits. Other more bizarre results have shown that changing the name of a survey-requester to match those of the survey-takers resulted in compliance that was twice as high. Even when having to choose which life to save, people are susceptible to the influence of artificially generated similarity. Furnham (1996) published results indicating that participants who were asked to rank people with kidney disorders on a waiting list for treatment chose those who matched their own preference for political parties.

One other factor that shouldn’t be very surprising is compliments. People tend to like those people more that appear to fancy them. Certainly, there are limitations to our credulity (e.g. when we can be very certain that the compliment is just a means to an end), but we generally believe that praises and compliments are genuine. An illustration of this fact is given by one study that involved a sample of men that were requested by another person to provide a small favor. Three conditions were tested: in the first, the men received exclusively positive comments about themselves, in the second they received exclusively negative comments, and in the third comments were mixed (Drachman, deCarufel, & Insko, 1978). The findings indicated that the men liked those requesters the most who gave only compliments. This was even true in those cases in which the participants were well aware that the requester wanted to gain something from their liking him. Furthermore, only in the exclusively positive condition it didn’t matter whether the stated compliments were correct or not, they produced identical amounts of liking.

The last factor that determines if we like somebody or something is contact and cooperation. People like what is familiar to them. To illustrate this, an experiment can be conducted by everyone at home: it involves taking a picture of oneself and printing the original as well as a reverse image (i.e. left and right side interchanged). When both pictures are shown to a friend who is asked to pick his favorite, he or she will likely choose the original, whereas the person on the picture will prefer the interchanged version. This results from the fact that both will decide on the picture that is most familiar to them. Since we see our own face most often in the mirror, the reverse image will seem more familiar and therefore more likable. Familiarity also accounts for an interesting election for attorney-general in Ohio in which a candidate, whose chances were expected to be very slim, made the race. The reason was that shortly before Election Day he changed his last name to something that had more political tradition in the state: Brown. This shows that we often unconsciously employ the rule of contact. Advertisers have found a way to use this principle in a very unobtrusive way. It has been shown that banner ads for a product (e.g. a camera) flashed in internet browsers five or twenty times produced more liking within the people who were browsing, although they did not consciously experience the flashing images.

Due to these findings, some professionals have advised to use a contact approach to improve race relations. They argued that more contact would lead to more familiarity among races and subsequently increase liking and decrease violence. However, school professionals have encountered the opposite pattern: increased mutual exposure will also increase prejudice between black and white students. A reason for this is that repeated contact doesn’t lead to increased liking when the contact is continuously experienced under negative conditions. One of these conditions is competition. Since schools employ a high degree of competition, exposure is likely to be perceived as negative. However, there are more advantages to the removal of segregation than there are disadvantages. Minorities’ performance levels for example are 10 times more likely to increase after desegregation. Consequently, education professionals developed a concept of cooperative learning to reduce competition to a healthier level.

What is cooperative learning?

The basis for the cooperative approach lies in research on intergroup conflict by Muzafer Sharif and his colleagues (1961). As a setting they chose a boy’s summer camp. What they found was that it didn’t need much to generate conflict between the kids. They simply divided them into two groups, each with their own residence cabin and each with a unique name (e.g. Eagles and Rattlers). Quickly after this separation, the groups started to degrade the rivals’ qualities and accomplishments. Treasure hunts and similar games that were performed in a cabin-against-cabin manner led to confrontations, name calling, and even raids of the rival cabin and stealing and burning of their banners, including written threats. Overwhelmed by the open hostility, the researchers quickly tried to undo their creation. In a first attempt, they employed the contact principle. But even under pleasant conditions like picnics and entertainment programs, food fights, and shouting, and aggression prevailed. The second attempt was strikingly simple and effective: Sharif and his colleagues generated some situation in which competition would have been harmful to both groups (e.g. interruption of camp’s water supply, a truck with food that was stuck and impossibly to be freed by only one group). The need for cooperation led to a fast abandonment of previous rivalry and both groups worked harmoniously to achieve their common goals. Friendships among members of different groups began to form and former aggression was completely extinguished.

To apply these findings to the former problem in schools, some specialists developed the jigsaw classroom. This approach requires cooperation among students in order to work through all the material that is to be tested in the end. Teams are formed and each member of the group receives a different part of the complete material (i.e. one piece of the puzzle). Consequently, pupils will need to help each other to perform best in the final examination. As a result, significantly more friendships were formed and less prejudice was observed. Furthermore, minority students’ scores, their self-esteem, and liking of the school increased, making them perform at least as good as their white classmates.

A different setting that makes use of the effects of common goals on liking is the police station. An approach that is termed Good Cop/Bad Cop is still used not only in American TV shows. When questioning a suspect, the person playing Bad Cop would first aggressively try to get the person to commit to the alleged crime. After some time of intimidation, Good Cop would start to try to calm down Bad Cop, ultimately giving him a coin and asking him to leave the room to get some coffee for everyone. Now alone with the suspect, he assures that he will put in a good word to the district attorney if he or she will make a confession. Subsequently, he will maintain that if they both work together, the sentence might be milder. Due to the contrast principle, Good Cop will be perceived as even more likable compared to Bad Cop and since he even spent his own money for coffee, the rule for reciprocity asks for a favor in return. Ultimately, instilling the common goal of working together towards a milder punishment will likely increase the likelihood for a confession.

What is the relation between association and conditioning?

It is a fact that people tend to dislike those who bring them unpleasant news, no matter whether this person caused the unpleasant information or not. Simply associating the informant with the news is enough. Reversely, the same is true for positive information. The foundation for this rule seems to lie in our upbringing: parents telling us not to play with the bad kids in the neighborhood, for example. It didn’t matter whether we did something bad ourselves, simply playing with the bad children would lead the other people from the neighborhood to associate us with bad news. That this perception is true was shown by some studies showing that people assume we share the personality traits of our friends.

Professionals who want to exploit the mechanism for their purposes are more likely to use the aspect of positive association. This is why attractive models almost always accompany advertisements for cars. Marketers want customers to associate beauty and desirability to their products. Results from one study support the effectiveness of such an approach. Cars were rated as faster, more expensive, and better designed when an attractive female model appeared in the commercial as opposed to another ad that showed the car alone (Smith & Engel, 1968). Interestingly, all participants denied the model’s influence on their ratings.

Other studies have observed the use of credit cards to investigate the rule of liking. First of all, it should be noted that credit cards allow for the spending of money without immediately paying. Therefore they are certainly stronger associated with positive aspects of shopping rather than with negative aspects of paying. Consequently, their specific logos, insignias, and signs should be attributed to the same positive feelings. Indeed, studies have found that larger tips were given at restaurants when customers paid with a credit card. Furthermore, students who browsed a catalog in a room with MasterCard symbols spent 29% more money for orders than did those who sat in a plain room, even though they did not consciously perceive the symbols. The same finding was applicable to a setting in which students were asked to donate for charity. 87% agreed when MasterCard symbols were present, only 33% did so when the room contained no signs.

Other applications include SALE signs which have been shown to increase customers’ spending even when they actually don’t save any money. The simple association SALE=bargain was enough. Furthermore, celebrity testimonials are used for the same reason, since their fame and other positive characteristics are automatically attributed to the product.

What are some examples of often-used acts of association?

When confronted with difficult legislative procedures, there is a tradition in the White House to convince skeptic legislators of the President’s position during a meal. Similarly, fundraising speeches are almost always held after a dinner. First of all, this engages the reciprocity rule. However, as Gregory Razran (1938) states in his papers on the luncheon technique, people increasingly like people while they are eating. This happens unconsciously and the technique is obviously still applied today. Interestingly, these findings seem related to the animal studies that were conducted by Ivan Pavlov. This is less surprising in light of the fact that Razran was one of the first who translated Pavlov’s papers to English.

The original studies were conducted on dogs and Pavlov managed to create an association between the dogs’ normal reaction to food, which is salivation, and an irrelevant stimulus, in this case a bell. By repeated exposure to food that was accompanied by the ring of a bell, the dog at some point started to produce saliva only by hearing the bell. Applied to the setting of the White House and the fundraising dinners, Razran stated that except for the increase in saliva, food elicits other responses as well, a good feeling for example. This could be associated to political statements just by serving a good meal.

Going back to the initial aspect of the principle of association, people are not generally unaware of the consequences. The fact that positive and negative news are attributed to the person delivering them leads to certain behavioral aspects. In one study by Rosen and Tesser (1970), subjects were asked to inform another participant about a phone call. 50% of the time the call brought good news, 50% of the time they were bad. In the first 50%, the informants always mentioned the good aspect of the call; however, in the other 50% they simply told the subject that there was a call waiting for them, avoiding to mention the negative aspect. Certainly, people are at least unconsciously aware of the fact that people will attribute to them the quality of the information they bring.

One area in which it is often the case that people link positive events to them while at the same time avoid a personal relation to negative events is sports. There are several aspects of sports that seem puzzling. Riots after the defeat of a favorite football team indicate that it is not merely a game to some people. Also, the presents some professional athletes receive from their fans seem irrational in light of their wealth. Obviously, there is a personal relationship between individuals and their teams or their favorite athletes. Another example is the story of a soldier from the second world war who stopped speaking after returning home to the Balkans when the war ended. As a result, he was put in a veteran's hospital and remained there till he died. However, after years of isolation, the radio in his room broadcasted a soccer match between the team of his hometown and a local rival. When the referee indicated a foul on the part of the soldier's favorite team, he shouted at the radio, giving vent to his anger. After this, he remained silent until the end.

This story shows that the relationship sports fans have with their team is both strong and personal. The fans attribute what is happening to the team to themselves. A defeat of the team is a defeat of oneself; the same is true for victories. The reason for this is the principle of association (in the case of the soldier the crucial element is his birthplace). However, as mentioned previously, people tend to claim responsibility for victories but distance themselves from defeats, due to a need to be perceived as successful as possible. An interesting finding shows that one of the most general ways we manage to do this is by using different pronouns. Imagine the fans of a team that just won a match, if interviewed they will most likely say such things as "We won the match!", or "We are in first place!". Few will state something like "They (the team) won!", or "They are in first place!". Faced with a defeat on the other hand, fans are unlikely to say "We lost." or "We are in the last place.". Rather they will attribute the loss to the team, distancing themselves from the loss and even showing open disappointment such as "They lost and destroyed our chances of making it to the finals!".

These findings are not exclusively applicable to sports arenas, one study investigating homeowners in Belgium after general elections and how long it would take them to remove the signs in their front gardens, indicating their favorite political party. The researchers found a positive relationship between election results and the time the homeowners left the sign up (Boen et al., 2002).

It is suggested that there are some people who are more excessive in the described behavior than others (e.g. groupies who trade sexual favors for the possibility to brag about knowing a star). These people tend to have poor self-worth and they use the association principle to inflate their low self-esteem. Another group of people who use the principle for this reason employ a different approach. Instead of strengthening the association between them and a desirable (famous) person, they make somebody who is already visibly related to them look more desirable. The clearest example for this group is the so called "stage mother". By making her child more appreciated by others, she often inflates her own self-worth.

How can exploitation be prevented?

A general approach is advised when defending against professionals who employ the principles associated with liking for their purposes. Instead of focusing on the things that elicit our liking of the exploiters or the products they promote, we should merely concentrate on the fact that inadequate liking has been produced. Whenever we like the professional more than we should, given the specific circumstances, we should be alarmed. In this case, we have to separate the alleged exploiter from the product he advertises. Concentrating exclusively on the advantages and disadvantages of the prospective purchase, we should be able to make a more independent decision.