This post is but my version of Eliezer’s article on the Illusion of Transparency.

Stories from home

Often times I’ve noticed with friends that they either say something and I misconstrue the intent or the other way around. For example, one of my friends is trying to startup and I tried to ask him something, when he started defending himself because he thought I was questioning his methods. I was merely enquiring. Often times I have had issues with my friends. One of my x-closest friends and I hadn’t talked for a a month or so, and then when I messaged her the usual way, she got furious. Same thing with my brother. I called my sister a Bitch in front of him. He got mad. I call everyone a bitch :).

We might think we are saying something but then people understand it as something else. #Illusion of Transparency?

Illusion of Transparency

Jane recommended a restaurant to Mark. Mark dines there and a) he loves it b) he is thoroughly appalled. Mark then called Jane and told her, “ I just finished dinner at the place you recommended, it was marvelous, just marvelous”. Keysar (1994) presented a group of subjects with (b) and asked them if they thought that Mark would be perceived as sarcastic by Jane. 59% thought that Jane would perceive it. To another group, (a) was presented. 3% thought that Jane would perceive sarcasm. Keysar and Barr(2002) seem to indicate that they used a particular recording that they played to all the groups. Further more, it appears that it is easy to manipulate the answers of groups. For example, if the subjects were told that the restaurant was horrible, and that Mark tried to conceal his sarcasm, majority of the subjects perceived that Jane didn’t see the sarcasm.

At this point the subjects just were puppets and based on the information told, they could be swayed consistently and reliably to the side wanted. Apparently it was just as likely for the subjects to predict that Jane would perceive sarcasm when Mark had a bad experience and concealed it, as in the case that Mark had a nice experience.

In another experiment Keysar and Henly (2002), told subjects different sayings, such as “the goose hangs high”. To two different groups they informed the meaning of this phrase as “future will look good”, and “future looks gloomy”, respectively. All subjects were asked if the meaning they were told would sound standard for an uninformed listener. All subjects guessed the same.

OI

1) To be continued with my own experiences.