Mindreading and Interpersonal Attraction

Join Peter Mitchell at the Horse and Jockey for a SciBar talk all about ‘Mindreading and Interpersonal Attraction’.

Most humans are good at mindreading, meaning that they are adept in interpreting signals in other’s behaviour to infer the cause of that behaviour. The behaviour in question has a proximal cause (an inner state, such as something the person is thinking), which in turn is related with a distal cause (an event in the world that triggered them to think of something in particular).

Peter Mitchell will talk about research demonstrating that people are surprisingly skilled at inferring the distal cause of others’ behaviour, suggesting by implication that they can infer others’ inner states. Some people are easier to ‘read’ than others. Recent evidence suggests that people who are easy to read also tend to be perceived as being likeable or interpersonally attractive.