For humans, receiving too much information interferes with our ability to process it. Our minds deal with this by quickly sorting the input received into two types: diagnostic and non-diagnostic. “Diagnostic is information of relevance to the evaluation being made; non-diagnostic is information irrelevant or inconsequential to that evaluation. When both categories of information are mixed, dilution occurs.”

Diagnostic v Non-Diagnostic

“The most robust psychological explanation for this is averaging." Rather than adding up pieces of information in their minds.. “So when you introduce irrelevant or even weak arguments, those weak arguments reduce the weight of your overall argument.”E.g. drug advertising. Commercials never end right after listing of major side effects, but rather on minor effects or neutral information. Consciously or not, they're using the dilution effect — watering down consumers’ assessments of drug risk

Averaging has Dilution Effect on your Argument

Resist the temptation to bury people under a blizzard of evidence, says psychology researcher Niro Sivanathan. He explains why.

Understand yourself and those around you.

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Longer Is Not the Answer)

<ul>Ignoring context : Crossed arms don't mean much if the room is cold or the chair they're sitting in doesn't have armrests. Everything has to pass the common sense test given the environment. So ask yourself: "Should someone in this situation be acting like this?" </ul><ul>Not looking for clusters : One of the biggest errors you make is looking for one single tell. That's great in movies about poker players but in real life it's a consistent grouping of actions (sweating, touching the face, and stuttering together ) that is really going to tell you something. So ask yourself: "Are most of this person's behaviors associated with X?" </ul>

Current Context

<ul>Not getting a baseline : If someone is always jumpy, jumpiness doesn't tell you anything. If someone is always jumpy and they suddenly stop moving - HELLO. So ask yourself: "Is this how they normally act?" </ul><ul>Not being conscious of biases : If you already like or dislike the person, it's going to affect your judgment. And if people <a href="https://www.bakadesuyo.com/what-two-things-can-help-you-win-over-someone">compliment </a>you, are <a href="https://www.bakadesuyo.com/whats-the-key-to-being-liked-and-being-more-i">similar </a>to you, are <a href="https://www.bakadesuyo.com/whats-more-likely-to-land-you-a-job-a-referra">attractive </a>... these can all sway you, unconsciously. (I know, I know, you don't fall for those tricks. Well, the biggest bias of all is thinking you're <a href="https://www.bakadesuyo.com/which-people-are-most-likely-to-give-in-when">unbiased </a>.) </ul>

Historical Context

Good News: your first impressions are <a href="https://www.bakadesuyo.com/2011/07/should-we-trust-our-first-impressions-of-peop/">usually pretty accurate </a>. Bad News: whether they are wrong or right, first impressions <a href="https://www.bakadesuyo.com/2010/03/are-first-impressions-really-that-big-a-deal/">affect us in a big way </a>and <a href="https://www.bakadesuyo.com/2012/02/are-we-a-slave-to-our-first-impressions/">we are slow to change them </a>.First impressions are often quite helpful but you have to be willing to update them quite rapidly. That's what's very hard to do.

First Impressions

Before we commence with the festivities, I wanted to thank everyone for helping my first book become a Wall Street Journal bestseller. To check it out, click here. *** We'd all like to learn how to read people like Sherlock Holmes. And research shows understanding things like body language is even more powerful than you might think.

Longer Is Not the Answer)

How To Read People: 5 Secrets Backed By Research - Barking Up The Wrong Tree

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