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social dynamics
You are more likeable when you make a mistake.
Competent individuals who commit a small, embarrassing blunder are rated as more attractive than those who remain perfect.
Elliot Aronson found that participants preferred a contestant who spilled coffee over one who answered every question perfectly. Perfection creates distance, while minor flaws signal human vulnerability.
Your mistakes do not undermine your status; they humanize it.
Where this comes from
- Study
- Aronson, Willerman, and Floyd (1966)
- What the check found
- The claim correctly identifies the core mechanism of the 1966 study by Aronson et al., though it omits the nuance that the effect is bidirectional based on the individual's initial competence.
- Confidence
- Well replicated
Related
One of these every day, and every one names the study it came from. When a finding is contested, it says so.