The Science of Likability: Charm, Wit, Humor, and the 16 Studies That Show You How To Master Them

80 Pages·2015·0.46 MB·English

by  Patrick King

The Science of Likability
Charm, Wit, Humor, and the 16 Studies That Show
You How to Master Them

By Patrick King Dating and Social Skills Coach at

www.PatrickKingConsulting.com

As a show of appreciation to my readers, I’ve put
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Table of Contents

The Science of Likability Charm, Wit, Humor, and the 16 Studies That Show
You How to Master Them Table of Contents
Introduction
Chapter 1: How to influence people’s moods.
Chapter 2: How to read people like a book.
Chapter 3: How to make friends out of enemies.
Chapter 4: How to never be taken advantage of.
Chapter 5: How to instantly become a close friend.
Chapter 6: How to negotiate anything and be persuasive.
Chapter 7: How to instantly bond with someone.
Chapter 8: How to make people trust you.
Chapter 9: How to get into someone’s inner circle.
Chapter 10: How to be endearing to anyone.
Chapter 11: How to make people do what you want.
Chapter 12: How to be a leader that anyone will follow.
Chapter 13: How to avoid judgment and assumptions.
Chapter 14: How to make people want you around.
Chapter 15: How to be credible and trustworthy.
Chapter 16: How to win a majority vote.
Conclusion
Cheat Sheet
Citations
Introduction

Like many college underclassmen that had no idea what they wanted to study, I
chose to major in psychology.

I thought it was a good default choice because the knowledge theoretically had
wide application and could transfer to any other field… Also, I heard that the
classes had mostly multiple-choice exams and finals.

But really, I could have done much worse, as psychology has turned out to have
some pretty helpful applications to my life and career.

The study of psychology isn’t about reading minds or interpreting dreams,
though I had a fair amount of people asking about that. It’s simply the study of
why people do the things they do. When you frame it that way, it’s easy to see
why that knowledge is useful in all walks of life.

There were the obvious applications such as discovering exactly what works in
advertisements and why, how to effectively use reverse psychology, and even
why we don’t feel compelled to take action when we’re surrounded by a crowd.
These were things I could immediately see and feel in my daily life.

But the biggest takeaway from my degree, a bachelor of science in clinical
psychology, was that so many of our decisions are made subconsciously and
without any awareness on our part. It often isn’t until far after we act that we
rationalize why.

For example, one of the more famous experiments in psychology was called the
Little Albert experiment. It involved a baby who was presented with a white rat
by itself. The baby had no reaction, positive or negative.

Next, the researchers paired the rat with a loud crashing noise, which obviously
scared Albert. After only a couple of exposures with the noise, Albert was
presented with the rat alone again. He had become afraid of the rat by itself.

He had started associating the rat with the loud noise that he hated, and likely
wasn’t aware of why he was suddenly recoiling and crying whenever he saw the
rat.

This was fascinating how something seemingly so subtle and unrelated could
affect people’s actions in very real ways.

If people can be subconsciously conditioned about negative associations, aren’t
there ways that people can be conditioned to react positively to objects and
people? What if Little Albert was conditioned to associate positive things with
the rat, such as food or his favorite toy?

This brings up possibly the most famous psychological experiment of modern
day, Pavlov’s dog.

Pavlov began to ring a bell every time he fed his dog. Dogs salivate when they
sense that food is nearby. When he started simply ringing the bell by itself, the
dog salivated as if there was actual food coming. The dog thought he was getting
bacon every time he heard the bell without any real clue why.

So in short, yes – it’s completely possible to become scientifically likable, and
have people wonder why you aren’t present.

I set out to find the best psychological studies in existence whose conclusions
could be interpreted to increase how likable someone is – the ones that literally
made you scientifically likable in proven ways.

A couple of these studies might seem to be proving obvious common sense, but
that’s only because what was subconscious is now conscious knowledge. Many
of these studies have proven phenomena on likability that is extremely
insightful, and perhaps even counterintuitive to human nature and psychology.

Fact is, they all work because of how our brains have been programmed over
thousands of years. We don’t always realize when or how, but they undeniably
form an image of someone who you just can’t help wanting around.

The 16 studies in this book will show you proven ways to make yourself
endearing, likable, funny, convincing, persuasive, trustworthy, credible, and
instantly magnetic. Why we hit it off with some people, but never with others.
That’s the science of likability.

Our leaders, politicians, and most charismatic friends aren’t that way just by
chance and luck! Whether or not they realize it, they embody much of what is
taught in this book. Now it’s your turn.
Chapter 1: How to influence people’s moods.

Why do some people instantly like us, while others never come around? Is it
purely on a random basis, and do we have to depend on lucky strikes of
lightning?

Likability in the minds of too many people is a game of chance. The good news
is they are completely wrong, and likability is like any other emotion – it can be
triggered, summoned, and ultimately engineered. Just like, say, the loudness of
your voice, we have quite a bit of control in just how likable we are.

And for the first time ever, I’ve collected a series of 100% empirical, scientific
psychological studies about how and why people like.

It turns out that we all have specific and subtle, signals and hints that massively
influence the way we view others. Most of them are miniscule, subconscious,
and mired in the minutiae – but that’s what really matters.

Remember Pavlov? It’s worth a repeat mention.

Pavlov is the father of classical conditioning as we know it, and proved it
through a very simple experiment with his dog. Every time he would feed his
dog, he would also ring a bell. Over time, the dog associated the food with the
bell. Eventually, Pavlov could just ring his bell, and the dog would begin
salivating because of the association with the food.

The dog was clueless as to why he would suddenly get hungry. Similarly, you
can influence your likability quotient. People may not be able to articulate just
why, but they’ll just know that they trust like and like you.
This takes the random chance out of making a positive first impression.

Your skill in likability can open many doors. It can have a tremendous positive
impact on all aspects of your life. Relationships are the backbone of a happy and
fulfilling life. Build yours with likability, and take advantage of the
psychological cues that science has proven over the years.

Mood influencing.

The science.

A 1994 study by Eich, Macauley, and Ryan found that memories did not exist in
a vacuum. Memories were heavily linked to the context, environment, events,
and moods that were present at the time of the memory.

In other words, if you are able to invoke anything that was present at the time of
a positive memory, you will be able to bring up the feeling of that memory to
influence and improve someone’s mood. You can also improve your memory by
thinking about things that were present in the context of that memory, and more
easily trigger a clearer understanding of what happened. They are all interrelated
and help recall each other.

What does this mean for us?

People’s moods and memory are highly linked. If you get a clear idea that
someone is in need of a mood boost, you can talk about things, people, and
events that were present when they were in fabulous moods. You can talk to
them in such a way to trigger certain positive memories. When you are
successful in jogging their memory based on their mood, they cannot help but
feel drawn to you. Bring up how ridiculous the slopes were on that ski trip last
winter and they can’t help but be influenced.

They will associate being around you with those positive moods they
experienced in the past, and they will begin to associate you with the positive
feelings.
Your ability to associate your presence with past great mood memories opens an
opportunity for interpersonal intimacy. This is emotional intimacy that gives
people the impression that you “get them.” They read in all sorts of positive
interpretations to their experience of being around you.
To make this dynamic work for you, you must first accurately determine
people's moods.

Determine people’s moods.

The simplest way to discover someone’s mood is by simply asking them a
neutral question.

This question really has no right or wrong answer. Just propose it to see if people
will answer in a non-neutral way.

What you are looking for is either a positive answer or a negative answer. If you
get a neutral or non-committal answer, you might want to rephrase your question
so you can get a more definitive answer.

The easiest question to ask is simply “How is your day?” or “How is your week
going?”

It will usually be easy to tell how people are feeling based on their body
language and tone of voice in answering these questions.

Influencing positively.

Once you have thrown out a neutral question and it was answered either
positively or negatively, you can trigger a positive response by improving their
mood.

As the study said, you bring up elements that were present in one of their
positive memories.

For example, if you know that someone had a blast the last time they went
skiing, bring up a story they were telling about it. Have them re-tell it to you.
Ask them about the logistics and whether or not they would recommend that
particular ski lodge. Talk about the drinking games they played that weekend.

By bringing up the memory elements that were tied to the happy mood they were
probably in, you will actually improve their current mood. By doing this, you
also eventually associate their positive mood with interactions with you.

This is crucial to likability because they will eventually identify being around
you with a positive range of emotions.

Here’s another example. You discover from your neutral question that someone
is in a rather poor mood. You know from prior conversations that this person
loves biking and biking is their favorite hobby by far. What elements of biking
could you bring to the conversation to improve their current mood?

Anything from the following list: their greatest biking adventure, their longest
ride, their favorite bike, their biking buddies, and their latest gear purchase.

By simply triggering happy memories of past positive moods and getting your
conversation partner to identify those happy positive memories with your
conversation, you pave the way for them identifying you with positive elements
of their lives.

This all happens subconsciously.

If you just keep dwelling on the same elements and topics over and over again, it
becomes obvious to your conversation partner that you are trying to somehow,
someway manipulate the conversation. Your efforts at creating a positive mood
association will become very transparent. Instead of warming up to you, people
might clam up. Worse, they might become even more suspicious or skeptical of
you.

Like Pavlov’s dog, this isn’t a process that we are fully aware of until we reach
the end result of suddenly salivating. Influencing people’s mood is something
that they won’t fully understand the cause of, but will nonetheless regard you in
better and higher lights.