You Have More Influence Over People Than You Think

Cosmopolitan:

Do you hesitate to ask people for favors simply because you assume they’ll say no? A new study suggests others are far more likely to do your bidding than you probably think.

For 10 years, psychologist, Vanessa K. Bohns, Ph.D., and colleagues from Cornell University asked hundreds of participants in multiple studies to pose random requests to over 14,000 strangers. (Among them: “Can I borrow your phone?” “Will you lie for more?” and, “Would you sponsor me in a race?”)

…

Why, then, does just saying what you want still seem so ominous? Many psychologists have blamed the stress of imposing on others as well as the fear of being rejected or exposed for having shortcomings we can’t fix on our own. But Bohns says her studies don’t find this to be the case. At least, not all the time.

More likely, she writes in the journal Psychological Science, “this phenomenon is the result of requesters’ failure to appreciate how uncomfortable it would be
for their targets to say ‘no’ to a request.”

Read the whole story: Cosmopolitan