Making first impressions is just as hard as judging them. Both sides of the conversation have people trying to impress each while still judging the other person. Speaking with social psychologist Amy Cuddy, Wired suggests that the best way to make a good judgement is to bring out their true nature as quickly as possible.


We all project ourselves a little differently on the first interaction, and we all discriminate when meeting new people a little bit. But if you're trying to judge someone quickly, Cuddy suggests you try to get the core of a person as quickly as possible:

To make an accurate judgment of somebody, you want to bring out their true nature. People need to trust you in order to be themselves. So trying to be the more dominant one in the interaction is probably going to make it harder for you to get accurate information about the other person, because it's going to shut them down. Or they're going to feel defensive, or they're going to feel threatened, or they're going to try to out alpha you. It's not going to be any sort of natural interaction. So I'm such a big believer in trying to establish trust, and there's evidence that shows that trust begets trust. I know people find this very controversial but it's true.

So, how do you actually do that? One way to do is to ask questions and take part it in a little small talk:


You can also establish trust by collecting information about the other person's interests—get them to share things about themselves. Just making small talk helps enormously. Research proves that five minutes of chit-chat before a negotiation increases the amount of value that's created in the negotiation.

It's a pretty simple process when it boils down to it, and it's mostly about projecting trustworthiness instead of dominance in social or business situations. Combined with some of our previous tactics to make and sustain a good first impression with body language and avoiding social narcissism, you'll be able to not only judge a person a little quicker, but also make a good impression yourself.

First Impressions: The Science of Meeting People | Wired



Photo by Slava.