Page 376 - The Social Animal

358 The Social Animal

some saber-tooth tiger meat as a gift, hoping that would do the trick.
Maybe he tried a new way of showing his teeth—not in a snarling,
threatening grimace but in a softer, more submissive way—a way that
eventually evolved into that gesture that we now call a smile. 1
After several thousand years, people are still speculating about
the antecedents of attraction—how to behave so that the person at
the next desk, in the next house, or in the next country likes us more,
or at least refrains from insulting us or trying to destroy us. What
do we know about the causes of attraction? When I ask my friends
why they like some of their acquaintances better than others, I get
a wide variety of responses.The most typical responses are that peo-
ple like most (1) those whose beliefs and interests are similar to their
own; (2) those who have some skills, abilities, or competencies; (3)
those with some pleasant or admirable qualities, such as loyalty, rea-
sonableness, honesty, and kindness; and (4) those who like them in
return.
These reasons make good sense. They are also consistent with
the advice given by Dale Carnegie in a book with the chillingly ma-
2
nipulative title How to Win Friends and Influence People. Manipula-
tive title notwithstanding, this recipe book for interpersonal relations
seems to have been exactly what people were looking for; it proved
to be one of the greatest best-sellers of all time. That’s not surpris-
ing. Americans seem to be deeply concerned with being liked and
making a good impression. Polls taken of high school students indi-
cate that their most important concern is the way others react to
them—and their overwhelming desire is for people to like them
more. Such concerns may be greatest during adolescence, when the
3
peer group assumes enormous importance, but the desire to be liked
is certainly not limited to U.S. adolescents. The search for a simple
formula to attract others seems universal. After all, Dale Carnegie’s
book was translated into 35 languages and was avidly read around
the globe.
Carnegie’s advice is deceptively simple: If you want people to like
you, be pleasant, pretend you like them, feign an interest in things
they’re interested in, “dole out praise lavishly,” and be agreeable. Is it
true? Are these tactics effective? To a limited extent they are effec-
tive, at least in the early stages of the acquaintance process. Data
from well-controlled laboratory experiments indicate that we like
people with pleasant characteristics more than those with unpleasant