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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind.

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Speaker 3: My name is Robert Mayant, and I am Joe McCormick.

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Speaker 3: And today we're going to be kicking off a series

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Speaker 3: on a concept that I have been thinking about a

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Speaker 3: lot lately. That is the idea of authenticity. I've been

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Speaker 3: thinking about doing an episode on this sort of off

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Speaker 3: and on for I think several years now. Authenticity is

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Speaker 3: really interesting to me because it is one of those

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Speaker 3: concepts that is extremely important. It's highly relevant to our lives.

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Speaker 3: We probably think about it every single day, and at

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Speaker 3: the same time, it is sort of vaguely defined. We

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Speaker 3: don't often stop to think about what it really means,

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Speaker 3: or to analyze how we evaluated, or what our criteria

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Speaker 3: of authenticity are and so forth. And I think that's

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Speaker 3: kind of a shame, because our judgments about personal authenticity

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Speaker 3: play into all kinds of things, into how we relate

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Speaker 3: to friends, acquaintances, and co workers, whether we trust political candidates,

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Speaker 3: how we make business decisions, how we understand and evaluate

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Speaker 3: music and poetry and other works of art and entertainment.

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Speaker 3: It's threaded all through our lives.

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Speaker 2: It even comes down to basic decisions that you wouldn't

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Speaker 2: even think of as getting into the core of authenticity.

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Speaker 2: I think everybody has at least one I don't know,

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Speaker 2: T shirt or other kind of garment and their wardrobe,

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Speaker 2: and you may find yourself wondering some days, is this

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Speaker 2: the day I wear this? Can I pull this off?

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Speaker 2: And and to some extent, you may be wondering about authenticity,

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Speaker 2: like can I wear this and be authentic? Or are

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Speaker 2: people going to see through me and they're going to

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Speaker 2: question whether I actually support that band, or whether whether

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Speaker 2: this is the appropriate color scheme for me? And so forth?

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Speaker 3: Is this T shirt really me today?

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Speaker 2: Exactly? Yeah? And as we'll get into like that answer

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Speaker 2: may change day to day, Like you know, we're we're

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Speaker 2: not necessarily the same person day to day, and what

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Speaker 2: is authentic one day may not be authentic the next.

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Speaker 3: Right before we started recording, I was thinking about how

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Speaker 3: authenticity is even often prescribed as a remedy for when

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Speaker 3: people are having difficulty with social relations or social interactions,

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Speaker 3: like when somebody's like, I'm having trouble making friends or

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Speaker 3: I'm having trouble with dating. What am I doing wrong?

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Speaker 3: What's the first thing people usually say to them, just

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Speaker 3: be yourself. That is advice there. Essentially that means be authentic.

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Speaker 2: Though it's a paradox, right, because at the same time,

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Speaker 2: there's no other way to hijack your own authenticity than

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Speaker 2: by overthinking your authenticity. Yeah, or at least that can

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Speaker 2: be the case. Yeah.

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Speaker 3: So, so you know, we invoke this concept all the time,

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Speaker 3: We make judgments about it all the time. These judgments

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Speaker 3: are highly relevant to our lives, but often we'd be

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Speaker 3: I think if you press most people on what does

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Speaker 3: it really mean, they'd probably have to think about it

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Speaker 3: for a bit before they could come up with an answer.

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Speaker 3: So I'm interested in exploring this question. What is authenticity

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Speaker 3: and a person in a statement in a work of art.

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Speaker 3: It seems to have some overlap with honesty, but is

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Speaker 3: not the same thing as honesty. In fact, I think

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Speaker 3: quite famously, there are people in the real world, and

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Speaker 3: like fictional characters you can think of, who are known

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Speaker 3: not to be honest, but are still widely considered authentic

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Speaker 3: in some way, like tricksters and liars and rascals who

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Speaker 3: are not thought to be reliable truth tellers, yet they're

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Speaker 3: also not thought to be personally fake. You know a

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Speaker 3: lot of like lovable scoundrels in movies. Han Solo is

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Speaker 3: a character who like lies all the time, but he

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Speaker 3: is you would probably judge him as authentic.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, he's true to himself and that's one of

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Speaker 2: the things we admire about him, Like, you know, he

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Speaker 2: shoots from the hip.

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Speaker 3: And what we might have a hard time coming up

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Speaker 3: with a clear and all cases appropriate definition of authenticity,

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Speaker 3: we definitely know what it is in opposition to its antonym, right,

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Speaker 3: the opposite of an authentic person is a person who

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Speaker 3: is fake. I think we all have this idea in

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Speaker 3: our mind of a fake person and we know them

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Speaker 3: when we meet them.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, but even this is this is the course

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Speaker 2: difficult to figure out as well, because there's so many

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Speaker 2: different versions of quote unquote fakeness in an individual, Like like,

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Speaker 2: what is the context is? Is it like a social situation?

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Speaker 2: I think that tends to be a situation where a

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Speaker 2: lack of authenticity is considered more of a red flag,

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Speaker 2: as opposed to say, like a customer service environment, where

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Speaker 2: you know, there's there's a lot of back and forth

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Speaker 2: there as well, and there is some nuance as well.

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Speaker 2: You can certainly come off too fake in a cut

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Speaker 2: customer service situation. But there is like a level of

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Speaker 2: like I am putting on the public face, I'm not

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Speaker 2: being one hundred percent myself because I am also representing

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Speaker 2: this company or whatever.

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Speaker 3: That's exactly right. Yeah, I mean, there are some jobs

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Speaker 3: that just require you to act a certain way regardless

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Speaker 3: of what you're feeling inside.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it's also interesting to think about. Yeah, this whole

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Speaker 2: idea of like an authentic person versus a fake person,

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Speaker 2: like someone who lies all the time, Because if someone

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Speaker 2: lies all the time, then they tell the truth in

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Speaker 2: a manner of speaking. You know. It's it's kind of

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Speaker 2: like that old Knight Knights and Knaves logic puzzle that

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Speaker 2: was that was popularized by the two gates scene in

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Speaker 2: Jim Henson's Labyrinth, which Sarah ultimately solves via answerer laundering.

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Speaker 3: Right, So one of the gatekeepers always tells the truth

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Speaker 3: and the other always lies, and with that you can

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Speaker 3: like solve the logic puzzle.

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Speaker 2: Right because since they're both absolutees, you can you can

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Speaker 2: compare their answers and eventually get yourself to the absolute

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Speaker 2: truth of the scenario.

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Speaker 3: So the dog at that gate that lies all the time,

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Speaker 3: you would probably not think of as a fake person

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Speaker 3: as someone who's inauthentic. The way one of the dogs

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Speaker 3: at the gates I think would actually be fake would

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Speaker 3: be if they like cultivated an outward facing persona as

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Speaker 3: a truth teller, but then secretly told lies sometimes, you know,

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Speaker 3: like if one of the dogs at the gates actually

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Speaker 3: broke their own rules about lying and telling the.

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Speaker 2: Truth, right, because then they would be inconsistent, which is

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Speaker 2: which is ultimately I guess what we're we're getting at

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Speaker 2: when it comes to, like the fear of someone in

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Speaker 2: a social scenario being fake is that they will they

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Speaker 2: will break a seeming track record, like they'll you know, oh,

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Speaker 2: they seemed like they were so authentic and they were

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Speaker 2: my friend, but then they weren't my friend. Whereas if

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Speaker 2: they were if they hated you the whole time, but

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Speaker 2: they perfectly kept up the front of being your friend

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Speaker 2: for say years or the course of your entire lifetime,

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Speaker 2: then they're essentially your friend, right, Yeah, Like if the

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Speaker 2: if the fake is perfect, it becomes the truth.

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Speaker 3: That's a really good point, and I think I think

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Speaker 3: in reality that would correspond with some philosophical ideas of

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Speaker 3: authenticity we'll get into in just a second. So for

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Speaker 3: a direct definition of authenticity in persons, and of course

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Speaker 3: you know that term gets applied to other types of

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Speaker 3: things as well, and we'll discuss that in a minute.

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Speaker 3: But in persons, I was looking I was looking at

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Speaker 3: a paper by Erica R. Bailey and Aaron Levy that

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Speaker 3: I'm either going to discuss later in this episode or

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Speaker 3: probably possibly in part two of this series. But in

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Speaker 3: that paper, the authors define an authentic person as quote

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Speaker 3: someone whose behavior is genuine and reflects their true inner

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Speaker 3: qualities and feelings. And I think this definition does get

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Speaker 3: at a large part of what people mean with this word. Usually,

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Speaker 3: authenticity has something to do with your outward behavior accurately

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Speaker 3: reflecting your true inner feelings and your true inner character.

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Speaker 3: So in short, authenticity is when the outside matches the inside,

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Speaker 3: or when something is in fact what it seems to be,

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Speaker 3: or when someone is in fact who they claim to be.

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Speaker 3: But while that's I think pretty straightforward to understand, it

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Speaker 3: still leaves a lot of questions unanswered.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, for starters, of course, we can never

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Speaker 2: truly know somebody's actual inner reality, their actual inner thoughts,

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Speaker 2: so it's all just us doing a mental model of

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Speaker 2: what this person's inner thoughts and actual intentions are. And

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Speaker 2: then it's yeah, it doesn't necessarily bear close scrutiny, right

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Speaker 2: because along these lines, a person with no filters or

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Speaker 2: composure whatsoever is the utmost authentic person you could hope

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Speaker 2: to meet. And generally speaking, these are qualities you come

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Speaker 2: to expect from say a cat or a dog. But

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Speaker 2: a great deal of striving to be a mature human

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Speaker 2: is knowing or learning how to manage the inner self

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Speaker 2: and and outer expression. And as we grow up, there's

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Speaker 2: a great deal to learn and develop along these lines.

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Speaker 2: And then we continue to learn and develop along these lines. Ideally,

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Speaker 2: you know, it's kind of a it's a never ending

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Speaker 2: journey of trying to figure out how to do all

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Speaker 2: this stuff and how to find that balance between how

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Speaker 2: you are inside and how you appear outside to not

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Speaker 2: necessarily everyone at once, but you know, different groups at

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Speaker 2: different times, how do you present yourself?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I think that's a great point. I mean,

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Speaker 3: we think we value authenticity as a desirable trait in

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Speaker 3: people to be friends with, people to put our trust

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Speaker 3: in as leaders and so forth, But in reality, a

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Speaker 3: person who authentically outwardly enacts every feeling they have and

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Speaker 3: every thought they have. We would usually view that person

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Speaker 3: as lacking in some kind of self control. Yeah, so

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Speaker 3: I think there's a sort of contradiction there within our desires.

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Speaker 3: But anyway, so while this definition I just mentioned, like

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Speaker 3: the is what it seems to be or are who

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Speaker 3: they claim to be definition, I think does cover a

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Speaker 3: lot of the usage of authenticity in everyday life, especially

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Speaker 3: when applied to persons and to artifacts. Discussing authenticity is

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Speaker 3: complicated by the fact that this word is used to

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Speaker 3: refer to a lot of different ideas that are all

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Speaker 3: somewhat related but also somewhat different. So I think about

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Speaker 3: a secondary usage of authenticity when describing an activity or

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Speaker 3: a product that has like a known cultural history. Example

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Speaker 3: that comes to my mind is making a recipe for

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Speaker 3: spaghetti carbonara. According to a lot of people, there will

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Speaker 3: be an authentic way to make this dish. You got

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Speaker 3: to use eggs but not cream, et cetera, et cetera,

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Speaker 3: And there are many inauthentic ways to make spaghetti carbonara,

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Speaker 3: And to some people there is something actually shameful or

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Speaker 3: bad about making it. In one of the allegedly inauthentic ways,

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Speaker 3: and the same category of cultural authenticity or inauthenticity. I

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Speaker 3: think I really often see it applied to food, but

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Speaker 3: I think it also gets applied to things like clothing, dances, crafts,

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Speaker 3: and other art forms. And so this understanding of authenticity

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Speaker 3: has some overlap with the is what it claims to

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Speaker 3: be definition, but it also seems to rope in some

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Speaker 3: other things, like it relies on additional assumptions.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it's interesting. The culinary example is really interesting to

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Speaker 2: ponder because the reality, of course, is that many examples

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Speaker 2: of the authentic in culinary tradition, these were at some

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Speaker 2: point the inauthentic new approach, you know, making use of

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Speaker 2: say new ingredients that there are a number of dishes

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Speaker 2: you can find throughout global cuisines that you think of

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Speaker 2: it as a particular form, but you're incorporating ingredients that

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Speaker 2: were brought in from some other location and just became

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Speaker 2: associated with that particular dish.

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Speaker 3: That's right. So I think the idea of authenticity and

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Speaker 3: these sort of like cultural performances or you know, making

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Speaker 3: a recipe or something, what it suggests is you're doing

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Speaker 3: it the way it's always been done, but in and

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Speaker 3: basically no case has it ever actually always been done

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Speaker 3: any particular way.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, so, and maybe being a little pedantic there,

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Speaker 2: but yeah, the point, because the point still holts that

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Speaker 2: when we're talking about an authentic culinary experience, we mean

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Speaker 2: that it's firmly rooted in the tradition, and not a

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Speaker 2: tradition that's existed since the beginning of time, but has

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Speaker 2: maybe existed for centuries, maybe decades, maybe just a few years.

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Speaker 2: And it also is probably rooted in a particular culture.

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Speaker 2: But again, the paradox is that authenticity is rarely truly

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Speaker 2: set in stone. It just may have the feeling of such.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that's right. And while we are sort

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Speaker 3: of questioning the idea of these various ideas of authenticity

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Speaker 3: and how much truth there is to them, really, at

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Speaker 3: the same time, like I feel it, like, you know,

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Speaker 3: if I see somebody like making spaghetti carbonaro with you know,

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Speaker 3: just like heavy cream and American cheese and mixing it

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Speaker 3: together with bacon, It's not like I think they're doing

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Speaker 3: something morally wrong, but I do reckon n there's some

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Speaker 3: kind of gap there. There is like a difference between

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Speaker 3: what they're doing and what a person might understand them

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Speaker 3: to claim to be doing. If that makes any sense,

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Speaker 3: Maybe that's too many orders removed. But do you understand

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Speaker 3: what I'm saying?

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Speaker 2: Yeah? Yeah, though, yeah yeah. Like I say, it's hard

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Speaker 2: to really figure out where to land on this, because

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Speaker 2: I was thinking about classic cocktails as an example of this.

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Speaker 2: You know, in many cases these are not terribly old,

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Speaker 2: but that people do get very possessive of, like original

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Speaker 2: recipes and so forth. Think the mytie, for example, which

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Speaker 2: we did a whole episode of Invention on years back.

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Speaker 2: We interviewed Jeff Beach Bumbarry about the origins of the

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Speaker 2: Mytai is a pretty fun shat, but yeah, my tie

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Speaker 2: is a classic tropical drink that merely dates back to

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Speaker 2: nineteen forty four. And when we talk about an authentic

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Speaker 2: my ti, we're generally talking about this nineteen forty four

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Speaker 2: trader Vic recipe. And in this particular case, you might ask, well,

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Speaker 2: does inauthentic equal bad? Well, oftentimes, yes, there are plenty

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Speaker 2: of bad my ties out there that are inauthentic, But

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Speaker 2: there are also noted historic variations of the my tie

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Speaker 2: that are not bad drinks, And there are various contemporary

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Speaker 2: spins on the cocktail that range from good to great. So,

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Speaker 2: in a weird sense, something can at once be authentic

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Speaker 2: and inauthentic. You can have a great spin on the

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Speaker 2: my tie that is inauthentic when compared to the original recipe,

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Speaker 2: but can still be an authentic product of a particular

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Speaker 2: mixologists or bartender's skill in creativity.

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Speaker 3: I think that's a great point, and I think, yeah,

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Speaker 3: what you're getting at there with like, there's another type

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Speaker 3: of authenticity that can be achieved even if the recipe

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Speaker 3: is not the same as what it originally was. But

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Speaker 3: you're saying an authenticity emerges out of another mixologist's creativity

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Speaker 3: and skill in putting something together, and that taps into

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Speaker 3: this whole other nebula of meanings that people today attached

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Speaker 3: to the word authenticity, which has something to do with

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Speaker 3: like it is related to outward behavior, but is not

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Speaker 3: necessarily about that matching your matching your inner character, matching

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Speaker 3: your inner feelings. It's more about like behavior that is

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Speaker 3: an achievement of your greatest potential or like living your

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Speaker 3: best life. Does that make sense?

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Speaker 2: Yeah?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, there is a way people talk about being an

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Speaker 3: authentic existence being one in which you do your best

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Speaker 3: you're like, become the best version of yourself that you

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Speaker 3: can be and do the best you can do.

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Speaker 2: Like it kind of a spin on that and just

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Speaker 2: our lingos. Occasionally go hear someone refer to as, say

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Speaker 2: a particular director or creator, and they'll be like, Oh,

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Speaker 2: this individual they're the real or this movie, this song,

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Speaker 2: this is the real deal. You know. It's kind of

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Speaker 2: you know, it doesn't necessarily connect to anything in particular,

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Speaker 2: but it does kind of at least imply that, like,

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Speaker 2: this is authentic. This is a work of someone's labor

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Speaker 2: and love and passion, Like someone put in the work here.

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Speaker 3: Another phrase that expresses this idea is the idea of

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Speaker 3: someone coming into themselves as an artist or as a

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Speaker 3: leader or as whatever, Like they are becoming the real

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Speaker 3: version of themselves by doing something great.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, Like what does that mean? Like they fulfilled the prophecy,

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Speaker 2: achieve their terrible purpose.

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Speaker 3: Yeah. So yet another definition of authenticity that has been

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Speaker 3: very important is one that is particular to existentialist philosophy,

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Speaker 3: in which I don't claim to be an expert on

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Speaker 3: existentialist philosophy, so I hope I'm summarizing it well enough here,

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Speaker 3: But the way I understand it is that these branch

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Speaker 3: In this branch of philosophy, authentic has this specialized meaning

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Speaker 3: where an authentic existence is basically living without illusions, accepting

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Speaker 3: the extent to which you are free to control your actions,

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Speaker 3: and accepting that you are thus defined by your actions.

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Speaker 3: And so I think a big emphasis of the existentialist

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Speaker 3: understanding of authenticity is accepting that you are what you

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Speaker 3: choose to do, and there's not like a separate secret you.

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Speaker 3: That's the real you that is different than what you do.

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Speaker 3: What you do is what you are, and in order

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Speaker 3: to be authentic, you have to accept that what you

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Speaker 3: do is what you are.

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Speaker 2: Okay, So it's not you are not who you are,

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Speaker 2: not what you would like to do. You are not

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Speaker 2: what you are thinking about doing. You are not what

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Speaker 2: you regret not doing. You are what you actually do.

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Speaker 2: What you actually choose to do is who you are.

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Speaker 3: That's the way I understand it, Okay, Fans of existentialism

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Speaker 3: complain at us an email if if you think I'm wrong,

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Speaker 3: if you Tuesday, yeah, and then of course there are

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Speaker 3: even more ideas of authenticity that we can continue to

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Speaker 3: explore in the rest of this series. But even coming

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Speaker 3: back to the baseline of the is what it seems

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Speaker 3: to be or the you are who you claim to

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Speaker 3: be definition, there are still a bunch of questions that

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Speaker 3: we can be left to wonder about, like why do

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Speaker 3: we place so much value on authenticity? And why is

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Speaker 3: authenticity especially important in some domains of life? What are

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Speaker 3: the criteria of authenticity in a person or in a

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Speaker 3: personal expression, What outward signs are we actually looking for

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Speaker 3: when we make judgments about it? Are we good at

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Speaker 3: making those judgments accurately? I think we're going to look

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Speaker 3: at a paper on that in just a minute. And also,

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Speaker 3: if we go with the definition above, do we truly

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Speaker 3: value authentic behavior as much as we think we do?

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Speaker 2: All right, let's dive into it.

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Speaker 3: Well, so we're probably going to address authenticity from the

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Speaker 3: angle of psychology research in a number of different ways

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Speaker 3: in the series, but I wanted to start off by

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Speaker 3: discussing a paper that was one of the first things

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Speaker 3: that really interested me when I started researching this topic.

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Speaker 3: This is the paper I mentioned earlier by Erica R.

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Speaker 3: Bailey and Aaron Levy, published in the journal Psychological Science

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Speaker 3: in twenty twenty two, and the title of the paper

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Speaker 3: is are you for real? Perceptions of authenticity are systematically

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Speaker 3: biased and not accurate that I'll give away the conclusions,

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Speaker 3: but I think there's some interesting stuff to learn along

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Speaker 3: the way. So at the time this paper was published,

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Speaker 3: the authors were affiliated with Columbia University. I think since

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Speaker 3: then Bailey has taken a position at Berkeley. But this

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Speaker 3: paper begins by asking a simple question, how good are

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Speaker 3: we at making accurate judgments about who is authentic and

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Speaker 3: who is not? This paper, again is the source of

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Speaker 3: the phrasing of the definition I mentioned earlier that quote. Theoretically,

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Speaker 3: a person is authentic when their behavior is genuine. That is,

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Speaker 3: their behavior reflects their true inner qualities and feelings. So

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Speaker 3: if the way they behave outwardly reflects who they really

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Speaker 3: are and how they really feel, and most of us

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Speaker 3: behave as if we think we're good at making these

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Speaker 3: judgments about others. You know, we do this all the time.

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Speaker 3: You talk to somebody for five minutes, and after you

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Speaker 3: walk away from them, you are pretty much ready to

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Speaker 3: say Jimmy was so earnest and sincere I really like him,

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Speaker 3: or Jimmy was so fake I couldn't stand that guy.

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Speaker 3: It's almost embarrassing to look back on how quickly we

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Speaker 3: think we can make these judgments about people.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, of course it makes sense given why

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Speaker 2: these this capacity for judging exists. I mean it comes

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Speaker 2: down to basic survival scenarios in which it maybe doesn't

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Speaker 2: pay to have an open mind. You know, comes back

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Speaker 2: to the you know, the very worn out example of

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Speaker 2: is there a tiger in the weeds there or is

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Speaker 2: there not a tiger? Well, you know, sometimes you can't

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Speaker 2: keep an open mind about the scenario. You have to

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Speaker 2: make a judgment call and then make your survival choices accordingly.

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Speaker 2: And you know that it holds true in life and

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Speaker 2: death situations, but then it ends up applying to these

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Speaker 2: various social contexts that are not life and death.

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Speaker 3: That's right. So you could look at it on one hand,

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Speaker 3: as there's a survival incentive for us to be suspicious

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Speaker 3: and to not give out trust too easily. You could

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Speaker 3: also look at it from the other hand and say,

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Speaker 3: maybe there are some scenarios where there is incentive to

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Speaker 3: trust more easily, maybe than we should because like, I

383
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Speaker 3: don't know trusting, Like you don't want to be hung

384
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Speaker 3: up being suspicious of people preventing you from cooperating to survive.

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Speaker 2: Right right, and ultimately like in action on any given

386
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Speaker 2: scenario is in action, like nothing is getting accomplished exactly.

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Speaker 3: So in the background section of their paper, the author

388
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Speaker 3: talk about they review previous research confirming that we really

389
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Speaker 3: do make these judgments about authenticity, and we base a

390
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Speaker 3: lot on them, Like people who are perceived as authentic

391
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Speaker 3: have been found to be more well liked, more easily trusted,

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Speaker 3: and authenticity is apparently considered especially important when people select leaders.

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Speaker 3: If you're going to look to someone for leadership for

394
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Speaker 3: some reason, people want somebody who is authentic, somebody who

395
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Speaker 3: that where they think the outside matches the inside. Now, Rob,

396
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Speaker 3: you brought this up earlier, but when you think about it,

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Speaker 3: it really would be kind of difficult to make a

398
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Speaker 3: judgment about another person's authenticity, especially after just a limited

399
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Speaker 3: time amount of time knowing someone, Because to really judge

400
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Speaker 3: somebody's authenticity by this main definition we're talking about, you

401
00:22:52,160 --> 00:22:56,919
Speaker 3: would have to both know someone's true inner self questionable

402
00:22:56,960 --> 00:23:02,000
Speaker 3: whether that's even a definable concept, and then also observe

403
00:23:02,119 --> 00:23:07,320
Speaker 3: their behavior carefully enough to accurately evaluate how well it

404
00:23:07,480 --> 00:23:11,320
Speaker 3: matches their inner self, and both of those are non trivial.

405
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Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's interesting because you know, especially when you

406
00:23:16,720 --> 00:23:19,360
Speaker 2: consider that a lot of the time when we're making

407
00:23:19,400 --> 00:23:22,360
Speaker 2: these knee jerk judgment calls, they're very simplistic, right when

408
00:23:22,400 --> 00:23:25,560
Speaker 2: we think we are understanding a person's inner self, we're like, oh,

409
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Speaker 2: they seem nice on the outside, but inside a slippery snake,

410
00:23:28,880 --> 00:23:32,280
Speaker 2: you know, And in all likelihood it's they're not just

411
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Speaker 2: complete evil on the inside. There. There's a fair amount

412
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Speaker 2: of complexity there. There are reasons why they, you know,

413
00:23:39,000 --> 00:23:41,520
Speaker 2: might be behaving this way or the other and so forth.

414
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Speaker 2: You know, it's most people's uh, inner self that we

415
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Speaker 2: cannot see again, to be clear, is going to be

416
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Speaker 2: rather complex with a lot of different moving parts.

417
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Speaker 3: There, absolutely right. And you know, I think a lot

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Speaker 3: of the inauthenticity that we encounter day to day is

419
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Speaker 3: situation and based on temporary roles rather than based on

420
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Speaker 3: people's like permanent personality traits. For example, probably one of

421
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Speaker 3: the most common ways you encounter clear inauthenticity is when

422
00:24:11,840 --> 00:24:14,879
Speaker 3: a salesperson is being really nice to you. You know,

423
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Speaker 3: does this salesperson really love me or do they really

424
00:24:18,600 --> 00:24:21,560
Speaker 3: want me to buy something from them? I mean, everybody

425
00:24:21,600 --> 00:24:23,679
Speaker 3: knows what's going on there, but it's based on like

426
00:24:23,720 --> 00:24:27,080
Speaker 3: a situation and a role more so than like that

427
00:24:27,160 --> 00:24:31,160
Speaker 3: person's inherent personality that they're just always a fake snake.

428
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Speaker 2: Right, Like it's yeah, just as it's it's probably it's

429
00:24:35,080 --> 00:24:37,120
Speaker 2: probably not the case that they're a fake snake that's

430
00:24:37,160 --> 00:24:39,880
Speaker 2: just one hundredercent pretending to like you and be cool

431
00:24:39,920 --> 00:24:43,680
Speaker 2: about everything. It's like the opposite is also unlikely that

432
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Speaker 2: this is one hundred percent the real person here that

433
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Speaker 2: they are they are really this into the product. It's

434
00:24:49,480 --> 00:24:51,520
Speaker 2: it's probably a balance, like maybe they are really into

435
00:24:51,560 --> 00:24:53,720
Speaker 2: the product, but maybe they also have had a very

436
00:24:53,760 --> 00:24:56,720
Speaker 2: long day and they are having to sort of act

437
00:24:56,800 --> 00:24:59,760
Speaker 2: a little bit uh to to get through this encounter,

438
00:25:00,119 --> 00:25:03,440
Speaker 2: and it's not necessarily a reflection on you, the customer exactly.

439
00:25:03,520 --> 00:25:06,080
Speaker 3: So the authors of this paper suggest that in lots

440
00:25:06,119 --> 00:25:10,120
Speaker 3: of cases, making judgments about the authenticity of others is

441
00:25:10,160 --> 00:25:14,000
Speaker 3: what they call quote a prohibitively difficult social judgment to make.

442
00:25:14,480 --> 00:25:18,120
Speaker 3: So their hypothesis is that we are not actually as

443
00:25:18,119 --> 00:25:21,560
Speaker 3: great as we think we are at assessing Jimmy's authenticity

444
00:25:21,640 --> 00:25:24,200
Speaker 3: after talking to him for five minutes, or maybe even

445
00:25:24,240 --> 00:25:27,240
Speaker 3: after working with him on a project for six weeks.

446
00:25:27,280 --> 00:25:30,320
Speaker 3: As we will see in some of these upcoming experiments,

447
00:25:31,040 --> 00:25:35,520
Speaker 3: our authenticity judgments of others they hypothesize will exhibit a

448
00:25:35,720 --> 00:25:40,240
Speaker 3: range of distorting biases, most of which will be related

449
00:25:40,359 --> 00:25:44,200
Speaker 3: to the personality of the rater rather than the person

450
00:25:44,680 --> 00:25:48,200
Speaker 3: being rated on a scale of authenticity. In other words,

451
00:25:48,240 --> 00:25:51,679
Speaker 3: authenticity is largely in the eye of the beholder. So

452
00:25:51,720 --> 00:25:55,399
Speaker 3: this paper includes three different experimental studies. The first study

453
00:25:55,520 --> 00:25:58,119
Speaker 3: is just a survey on the Internet of lay people

454
00:25:58,520 --> 00:26:01,280
Speaker 3: to try to establish two things that were assumed but

455
00:26:01,320 --> 00:26:04,639
Speaker 3: they wanted to confirm them experimentally. Number one is people

456
00:26:04,720 --> 00:26:07,520
Speaker 3: do believe they can tell who is authentic and who

457
00:26:07,560 --> 00:26:11,359
Speaker 3: is not. And number two is people think that authenticity

458
00:26:11,640 --> 00:26:14,520
Speaker 3: is a very important trait in others it matters a lot,

459
00:26:14,840 --> 00:26:17,280
Speaker 3: and their surveys did indeed conclude that that is what

460
00:26:17,280 --> 00:26:30,199
Speaker 3: people think. The second study, this was a series of

461
00:26:30,280 --> 00:26:33,440
Speaker 3: surveys to test how good we are at judging authenticity

462
00:26:34,000 --> 00:26:37,920
Speaker 3: the authenticity of others. Now you can imagine the methodological

463
00:26:37,960 --> 00:26:43,000
Speaker 3: problems presented here. How do you objectively characterize a person's

464
00:26:43,160 --> 00:26:46,520
Speaker 3: true inner self and feelings, and how do you measure

465
00:26:46,600 --> 00:26:50,439
Speaker 3: the extent to which their external actions reflect that inner self.

466
00:26:50,880 --> 00:26:53,119
Speaker 3: You can't really do that, that's not possible. But the

467
00:26:53,160 --> 00:26:55,480
Speaker 3: authors come up with what I think is a very

468
00:26:55,480 --> 00:26:58,439
Speaker 3: clever proxy to look at. So what they do is

469
00:26:58,480 --> 00:27:03,800
Speaker 3: they compare other assessments to self assessments. So how does

470
00:27:03,800 --> 00:27:07,439
Speaker 3: that work? So the test subjects in this study this

471
00:27:07,520 --> 00:27:11,320
Speaker 3: part of the paper were incoming NBA students who were

472
00:27:11,400 --> 00:27:14,680
Speaker 3: randomly assigned to classroom work groups of four to six

473
00:27:14,720 --> 00:27:19,080
Speaker 3: students each, and these participants would work together continuously throughout

474
00:27:19,119 --> 00:27:23,439
Speaker 3: the semester of this school year and would complete a

475
00:27:23,520 --> 00:27:26,879
Speaker 3: number of surveys over the course of six weeks at

476
00:27:26,880 --> 00:27:32,280
Speaker 3: different time intervals, including surveys about themselves, answering questions about

477
00:27:32,280 --> 00:27:36,959
Speaker 3: their own authenticity and personality, and a multiple time points

478
00:27:37,200 --> 00:27:41,920
Speaker 3: rating the authenticity and personality of other members of their group,

479
00:27:42,000 --> 00:27:44,160
Speaker 3: people they had been working with, but also people who

480
00:27:44,160 --> 00:27:46,760
Speaker 3: they didn't know before. So they're randomly assigned in these

481
00:27:46,760 --> 00:27:49,000
Speaker 3: groups and they would get to know them over the

482
00:27:49,040 --> 00:27:51,240
Speaker 3: course of the study. And so I think this method

483
00:27:51,280 --> 00:27:53,400
Speaker 3: makes a lot of sense. It would be hard, maybe

484
00:27:53,440 --> 00:27:57,159
Speaker 3: even impossible to test and quantify a person's true self,

485
00:27:57,680 --> 00:28:00,760
Speaker 3: but you can compare what other people say about you

486
00:28:00,880 --> 00:28:04,200
Speaker 3: based on your actions to what you say about yourself

487
00:28:04,320 --> 00:28:07,920
Speaker 3: in private, and that comparison can tell us a good bit. Now,

488
00:28:07,960 --> 00:28:11,280
Speaker 3: the authors do explore some complications here that extend from

489
00:28:11,400 --> 00:28:14,960
Speaker 3: using self rated authenticity as a standard. For example, they

490
00:28:14,960 --> 00:28:19,080
Speaker 3: point out that previous studies have found that people this

491
00:28:19,280 --> 00:28:23,920
Speaker 3: was interesting. They perceive their own positive actions as authentic

492
00:28:24,000 --> 00:28:27,919
Speaker 3: to themselves relative to their own negative actions, which are

493
00:28:28,000 --> 00:28:31,400
Speaker 3: less authentic to themselves. You know, that's how we are.

494
00:28:32,080 --> 00:28:36,000
Speaker 3: And self ratings of authenticity also appear to be influenced

495
00:28:36,040 --> 00:28:38,400
Speaker 3: by mood, So maybe if you are feeling in a

496
00:28:38,400 --> 00:28:41,440
Speaker 3: good mood, you will also rate yourself as a more

497
00:28:41,480 --> 00:28:46,880
Speaker 3: authentic person. So there are complications here, But understanding these limitations,

498
00:28:47,520 --> 00:28:50,040
Speaker 3: I still think self ratings seem like a good point

499
00:28:50,040 --> 00:28:53,240
Speaker 3: of comparison to look at when to compare with the

500
00:28:53,320 --> 00:28:56,959
Speaker 3: ratings by others. So survey questions asking people about their

501
00:28:57,000 --> 00:29:01,160
Speaker 3: own authenticity would include agreeing or disagreeing to a very

502
00:29:01,400 --> 00:29:04,680
Speaker 3: on like a number scale, with items like I am

503
00:29:04,800 --> 00:29:08,560
Speaker 3: true to myself in most situations or I am more

504
00:29:08,640 --> 00:29:13,240
Speaker 3: sincere in my interactions than strategic. This was to examine

505
00:29:13,240 --> 00:29:15,960
Speaker 3: authenticity as a stable trait, meaning like a sort of

506
00:29:16,040 --> 00:29:19,000
Speaker 3: semi permanent trait of a personality. But then they also

507
00:29:19,080 --> 00:29:22,680
Speaker 3: measured what is called state authenticity, which can change over

508
00:29:22,720 --> 00:29:24,720
Speaker 3: time and is more of a feeling in the moment,

509
00:29:24,840 --> 00:29:29,120
Speaker 3: with items like I feel fake or I feel like

510
00:29:29,200 --> 00:29:32,600
Speaker 3: I am pretending to be something I am not. They

511
00:29:32,640 --> 00:29:36,000
Speaker 3: also asked people to compare their actions to their inner

512
00:29:36,040 --> 00:29:39,400
Speaker 3: selves with statements like there have been times where when

513
00:29:39,400 --> 00:29:42,520
Speaker 3: I felt like I couldn't be myself with my classmates.

514
00:29:43,440 --> 00:29:46,600
Speaker 3: And then participants were also asked to judge whether others

515
00:29:46,760 --> 00:29:49,760
Speaker 3: knew who they really were or not. And then they

516
00:29:49,760 --> 00:29:53,040
Speaker 3: also took a personality test based on the Big five model.

517
00:29:53,360 --> 00:29:56,160
Speaker 3: So what were the findings here, Well, the researchers found

518
00:29:56,160 --> 00:30:01,760
Speaker 3: that self rated trait authenticity was an not predictive of

519
00:30:01,840 --> 00:30:06,360
Speaker 3: other rated trait authenticity, So in judging authenticity, what people

520
00:30:06,440 --> 00:30:10,480
Speaker 3: said about themselves had no relationship on average to what

521
00:30:10,560 --> 00:30:14,600
Speaker 3: other people said about them same thing for state authenticity.

522
00:30:15,600 --> 00:30:18,960
Speaker 3: State Remember was I feel fake versus the permanent trade

523
00:30:18,960 --> 00:30:22,800
Speaker 3: of I am fake? Again, in this case, no relationship

524
00:30:22,840 --> 00:30:26,920
Speaker 3: at all emerged between self ratings and other ratings. Same

525
00:30:27,000 --> 00:30:31,160
Speaker 3: for the questions about acting authentically. No pattern of correlation

526
00:30:31,280 --> 00:30:34,600
Speaker 3: between self ratings and other ratings. Overall, there was no

527
00:30:34,920 --> 00:30:40,000
Speaker 3: significant relationship between self and other rated authenticity, which is

528
00:30:40,040 --> 00:30:43,479
Speaker 3: pretty strange given how confident we are that we that

529
00:30:43,560 --> 00:30:46,040
Speaker 3: we know whether others are being authentic or not.

530
00:30:47,520 --> 00:30:50,560
Speaker 2: So all that mental energy you may put into deciding

531
00:30:50,920 --> 00:30:54,840
Speaker 2: whether you're gonna wear that T shirt today, it may

532
00:30:54,880 --> 00:30:57,880
Speaker 2: be just completely useless, because people are going to decide

533
00:30:57,960 --> 00:31:02,400
Speaker 2: you were being authentic or inauthentic via that choice in

534
00:31:02,440 --> 00:31:03,880
Speaker 2: a way that has nothing to do with how you're

535
00:31:03,920 --> 00:31:04,600
Speaker 2: feeling about it.

536
00:31:04,920 --> 00:31:07,280
Speaker 3: Yeah, and this doesn't rule out that there will be

537
00:31:07,520 --> 00:31:11,360
Speaker 3: individual cases where you accurately perceive that somebody is being

538
00:31:11,400 --> 00:31:13,640
Speaker 3: fake with you. I mean, obviously we do probably make

539
00:31:13,720 --> 00:31:17,360
Speaker 3: correct judgments about that sometime. But what this study found is,

540
00:31:17,400 --> 00:31:19,880
Speaker 3: at least within this setting where it's like students working

541
00:31:19,880 --> 00:31:23,440
Speaker 3: together on classroom projects, over the course of six weeks,

542
00:31:23,880 --> 00:31:27,080
Speaker 3: no pattern emerged at all. On average people could not tell.

543
00:31:28,200 --> 00:31:31,280
Speaker 3: One observation that struck me as interesting was that the

544
00:31:31,320 --> 00:31:34,280
Speaker 3: author is right quote the majority of the variance in

545
00:31:34,400 --> 00:31:38,360
Speaker 3: authenticity ratings had to do with differences between the ones

546
00:31:38,600 --> 00:31:44,760
Speaker 3: making the ratings and across unique relationships, rather than differences

547
00:31:44,960 --> 00:31:48,600
Speaker 3: in the target. So to explain that at least within

548
00:31:48,680 --> 00:31:53,840
Speaker 3: this experiment when you perceive someone else as fake that

549
00:31:53,960 --> 00:31:57,600
Speaker 3: apparently does not have a lot to say about that

550
00:31:57,720 --> 00:32:01,520
Speaker 3: person individually and tends to say more about you as

551
00:32:01,560 --> 00:32:05,920
Speaker 3: the perceiver or the unique relationship between you and that

552
00:32:06,000 --> 00:32:10,160
Speaker 3: person you're perceiving. So there were there weren't like individuals

553
00:32:10,360 --> 00:32:13,800
Speaker 3: in these experiments who were repeatedly getting rated as as

554
00:32:13,880 --> 00:32:17,640
Speaker 3: fake or as real by everybody around them. Instead the real,

555
00:32:18,080 --> 00:32:21,280
Speaker 3: Like the patterns seem to emerge in the people doing

556
00:32:21,320 --> 00:32:24,240
Speaker 3: the ratings of others or in individual one on one

557
00:32:24,320 --> 00:32:25,800
Speaker 3: relationships between people.

558
00:32:26,440 --> 00:32:28,440
Speaker 2: Okay, so yeah, so you can be very skewed and

559
00:32:28,520 --> 00:32:33,560
Speaker 2: how you're going to interpret an individual moving forward, Like

560
00:32:33,720 --> 00:32:35,840
Speaker 2: what's the name of our is it Jeff? Is Jeff?

561
00:32:35,840 --> 00:32:36,880
Speaker 2: Are hypothetical?

562
00:32:37,040 --> 00:32:37,200
Speaker 1: Oh?

563
00:32:37,200 --> 00:32:38,800
Speaker 3: I think it was Jimmy today Jimmy.

564
00:32:38,840 --> 00:32:41,560
Speaker 2: Okay. So, like if your first exposure to Jimmy in

565
00:32:41,600 --> 00:32:45,360
Speaker 2: the workplace is him like actually blatantly stealing somebody's lunch

566
00:32:45,360 --> 00:32:47,960
Speaker 2: and eating it in the great room, and then you

567
00:32:48,040 --> 00:32:51,400
Speaker 2: have actual personal interactions with him, you might be inclined

568
00:32:51,440 --> 00:32:53,800
Speaker 2: to think, oh, this this Jimmy's a snake. He's he's

569
00:32:54,040 --> 00:32:57,920
Speaker 2: he's stealing people's lunches and being sneaky. He must he

570
00:32:58,000 --> 00:33:01,240
Speaker 2: must be inauthentic with me as well. But of course,

571
00:33:01,280 --> 00:33:03,200
Speaker 2: if we slow that down and we think about it,

572
00:33:03,200 --> 00:33:06,560
Speaker 2: it's entire it's entirely possible for someone to have no

573
00:33:06,680 --> 00:33:11,040
Speaker 2: qualms about stealing people's lunches and also like be honest

574
00:33:11,120 --> 00:33:14,160
Speaker 2: and well meeting in their personal interaction with you. I mean,

575
00:33:14,200 --> 00:33:20,040
Speaker 2: this is not an impossibility in human behavior and personal judgment. Right.

576
00:33:20,160 --> 00:33:23,520
Speaker 3: So, whereas you might think that if if one person

577
00:33:23,640 --> 00:33:27,240
Speaker 3: perceives Jimmy as fake, then everybody else will perceive Jimmy

578
00:33:27,240 --> 00:33:30,880
Speaker 3: as fake as well, but that's not the case, right right, Yeah, Instead,

579
00:33:30,880 --> 00:33:34,920
Speaker 3: it's more likely that I am perceiving lots of people

580
00:33:35,000 --> 00:33:38,680
Speaker 3: around me as fake, or that there's something special about

581
00:33:38,720 --> 00:33:41,480
Speaker 3: my relationship with Jimmy that makes me think he's fake.

582
00:33:41,800 --> 00:33:43,400
Speaker 2: Or I guess to put a positive spin on it,

583
00:33:43,440 --> 00:33:45,840
Speaker 2: you know, it's like you have, you know, and I

584
00:33:45,840 --> 00:33:47,600
Speaker 2: think we probably have all had these situations where we

585
00:33:47,640 --> 00:33:50,280
Speaker 2: have a certain preconceived notion about somebody and then we

586
00:33:50,320 --> 00:33:53,400
Speaker 2: have a really positive interaction with them, and that turns

587
00:33:53,440 --> 00:33:55,240
Speaker 2: things around, and we may be able to reflect on

588
00:33:55,280 --> 00:33:57,640
Speaker 2: that later and be like, well, I used to and

589
00:33:57,880 --> 00:33:59,520
Speaker 2: it may boil down to I used to think this

590
00:33:59,560 --> 00:34:02,280
Speaker 2: person was in authentic, and then I got to know

591
00:34:02,320 --> 00:34:04,160
Speaker 2: them a little bit, or then I worked with them

592
00:34:04,160 --> 00:34:07,320
Speaker 2: a little better or so forth, you know, and you know,

593
00:34:07,560 --> 00:34:10,319
Speaker 2: in those cases we can actually kind of see how

594
00:34:10,360 --> 00:34:11,080
Speaker 2: this can shift.

595
00:34:11,719 --> 00:34:13,960
Speaker 3: Oh, that's very interesting. I want to come back and

596
00:34:14,000 --> 00:34:17,600
Speaker 3: discuss the variable of familiarity at the end. Here a

597
00:34:17,640 --> 00:34:22,080
Speaker 3: couple more things Before that, some interesting biases emerged in

598
00:34:22,120 --> 00:34:23,960
Speaker 3: the data. I'm not going to go into everything, but

599
00:34:24,120 --> 00:34:25,719
Speaker 3: just a couple of things that stood out to me.

600
00:34:26,320 --> 00:34:30,480
Speaker 3: One thing is people were likely to rate other participants

601
00:34:30,520 --> 00:34:35,480
Speaker 3: as more authentic than they rated themselves. So that's kind

602
00:34:35,480 --> 00:34:37,279
Speaker 3: of interesting. It compares to a lot of you know,

603
00:34:37,280 --> 00:34:39,480
Speaker 3: on a lot of measures, people kind of have a

604
00:34:39,520 --> 00:34:43,399
Speaker 3: high opinion of themselves. People on average rate themselves as

605
00:34:43,480 --> 00:34:48,360
Speaker 3: more honest, more altruistic, whatever than other people. But on authenticity,

606
00:34:48,360 --> 00:34:50,720
Speaker 3: at least in this experiment, that's not the case. People

607
00:34:50,800 --> 00:34:55,120
Speaker 3: on average rated other people as more authentic than themselves,

608
00:34:55,480 --> 00:34:57,880
Speaker 3: so they thought that they were a little bit faker

609
00:34:57,920 --> 00:34:58,840
Speaker 3: than everybody else.

610
00:34:59,360 --> 00:35:02,319
Speaker 2: In a way that this could be it could be

611
00:35:02,360 --> 00:35:04,360
Speaker 2: kind of a backhanded conflict because it might not be

612
00:35:04,400 --> 00:35:07,279
Speaker 2: a situation of thinking that everyone around you has a

613
00:35:07,280 --> 00:35:10,520
Speaker 2: complex in our life, but kind of dismissing people as

614
00:35:10,840 --> 00:35:13,799
Speaker 2: being like just the sum of their actions, like not

615
00:35:13,840 --> 00:35:16,920
Speaker 2: even thinking about the fact that there is you know,

616
00:35:16,960 --> 00:35:18,960
Speaker 2: a lot of a lot of inner thought going on

617
00:35:19,160 --> 00:35:21,880
Speaker 2: behind the scenes with a particular individual. It's like, Oh,

618
00:35:22,080 --> 00:35:23,879
Speaker 2: I just passed that person in the hallway. Yeah, yeah,

619
00:35:23,880 --> 00:35:25,680
Speaker 2: I guess they're one hundred percent what I see that

620
00:35:25,760 --> 00:35:29,399
Speaker 2: they are fine, Yeah, no questions of authenticity at all.

621
00:35:29,800 --> 00:35:31,960
Speaker 2: But it could be kind of a situation where yeah,

622
00:35:32,000 --> 00:35:33,520
Speaker 2: you're just because you don't think about them, you take

623
00:35:33,560 --> 00:35:35,960
Speaker 2: them completely for granted, and you think that this one

624
00:35:36,000 --> 00:35:37,399
Speaker 2: thing you see them do is all they are.

625
00:35:37,719 --> 00:35:40,319
Speaker 3: I think that's quite possible. Another thing that was interesting here,

626
00:35:40,320 --> 00:35:42,640
Speaker 3: we were talking about the idea of authenticity being in

627
00:35:42,680 --> 00:35:46,040
Speaker 3: the eye of the beholder, and that it like ratings

628
00:35:46,080 --> 00:35:48,279
Speaker 3: of the authenticity of others seem to say more about

629
00:35:48,280 --> 00:35:54,320
Speaker 3: the rater than the rate. Apparently people rated themselves. People

630
00:35:54,400 --> 00:35:58,359
Speaker 3: who rated themselves as more authentic also rated others as

631
00:35:58,440 --> 00:36:00,800
Speaker 3: more authentic, So there was just sort of a direct

632
00:36:00,840 --> 00:36:04,080
Speaker 3: correlation there, like I think I'm more authentic, thus I

633
00:36:04,080 --> 00:36:05,680
Speaker 3: think other people are more authentic.

634
00:36:06,320 --> 00:36:07,080
Speaker 2: M okay.

635
00:36:07,640 --> 00:36:10,279
Speaker 3: And in this particular study, it found there were no

636
00:36:10,520 --> 00:36:15,000
Speaker 3: individual demographic facts or personality traits that resulted in subjects

637
00:36:15,040 --> 00:36:18,359
Speaker 3: being significantly rated as more or less authentic. Nothing really

638
00:36:18,400 --> 00:36:22,680
Speaker 3: about people that seemed to contribute there. A third study

639
00:36:22,760 --> 00:36:26,200
Speaker 3: attempted to replicate study two with a larger sample size,

640
00:36:26,239 --> 00:36:28,920
Speaker 3: but with a few changes, this time with a mix

641
00:36:29,040 --> 00:36:32,520
Speaker 3: of virtual and in person interactions instead of just purely

642
00:36:32,560 --> 00:36:36,160
Speaker 3: in person meetings, and this study broadly found the same

643
00:36:36,200 --> 00:36:40,239
Speaker 3: thing as study number two. Also, study three found the

644
00:36:40,280 --> 00:36:43,560
Speaker 3: same biases as study two. However, in this study they

645
00:36:43,600 --> 00:36:47,120
Speaker 3: did find a couple of personality and demographic factors that

646
00:36:47,200 --> 00:36:52,120
Speaker 3: correlated with other ratings of authenticity. Here, people were more

647
00:36:52,239 --> 00:36:55,640
Speaker 3: likely to be rated as authentic if they were high

648
00:36:55,680 --> 00:37:00,040
Speaker 3: in the Big five personality trait known as agreeableness, and

649
00:37:00,239 --> 00:37:07,520
Speaker 3: the big five personality traits are typically openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness,

650
00:37:07,560 --> 00:37:12,920
Speaker 3: and neuroticism. Agreeableness is a general rating of pro social

651
00:37:12,960 --> 00:37:17,919
Speaker 3: tendencies including trust, kindness, generosity, things like that. So people

652
00:37:17,920 --> 00:37:20,319
Speaker 3: who were higher in trade agreeableness were thought to be

653
00:37:20,360 --> 00:37:24,200
Speaker 3: more authentic, and also, interestingly, people who were a little

654
00:37:24,239 --> 00:37:28,160
Speaker 3: bit older were rated as more authentic. But overall, the

655
00:37:28,320 --> 00:37:32,640
Speaker 3: authors concluded quote we found no evidence that people can

656
00:37:32,680 --> 00:37:36,719
Speaker 3: accurately identify who is authentic. So that's the top line there.

657
00:37:36,800 --> 00:37:40,640
Speaker 3: We're going around making judgments about authenticity of other people

658
00:37:40,719 --> 00:37:44,640
Speaker 3: all the time. Maybe sometimes these judgments are correct, but

659
00:37:44,920 --> 00:37:48,120
Speaker 3: within the confines of this study with students working together

660
00:37:48,160 --> 00:37:51,880
Speaker 3: in classrooms, there was no correlation. On average. On average,

661
00:37:51,920 --> 00:37:54,839
Speaker 3: people were no better than chance at judging the authenticity

662
00:37:54,840 --> 00:37:57,680
Speaker 3: of others. Oh wow, now I want to come back

663
00:37:57,680 --> 00:38:00,480
Speaker 3: to the thing you were mentioning a minute ago about

664
00:38:00,520 --> 00:38:03,239
Speaker 3: people getting to know each other, rob because this was

665
00:38:03,280 --> 00:38:05,840
Speaker 3: one of the most interesting things that jumped out at

666
00:38:05,920 --> 00:38:09,480
Speaker 3: me from the discussion section of this paper. So the

667
00:38:09,560 --> 00:38:13,560
Speaker 3: author's write quote. A surprising finding in our data was

668
00:38:13,600 --> 00:38:20,600
Speaker 3: that familiarity did not increase the accuracy of perceived authenticity. Rather,

669
00:38:21,000 --> 00:38:24,120
Speaker 3: the greater the familiarity between a raider and their target,

670
00:38:24,560 --> 00:38:31,160
Speaker 3: the less accurate their authenticity ratings became. Specifically, as familiarity increased,

671
00:38:31,680 --> 00:38:36,840
Speaker 3: other rated authenticity grew increasingly more positive relative to the

672
00:38:36,920 --> 00:38:40,319
Speaker 3: target's self rated authenticity. So does that make sense, Like,

673
00:38:40,360 --> 00:38:43,239
Speaker 3: as you get to know somebody better, they're over there

674
00:38:43,800 --> 00:38:46,640
Speaker 3: still sitting there saying like, yeah, sometimes I feel fake.

675
00:38:46,760 --> 00:38:49,320
Speaker 3: I can't I feel like I can't be myself around people.

676
00:38:49,640 --> 00:38:51,279
Speaker 3: The face I show the world is not who I

677
00:38:51,320 --> 00:38:54,120
Speaker 3: really am and you are over time as you get

678
00:38:54,120 --> 00:38:57,399
Speaker 3: to know them better, saying more and more like so authentic, so.

679
00:38:57,640 --> 00:39:03,359
Speaker 2: Themselves interesting thing. That's a fascinating one though, to try

680
00:39:03,360 --> 00:39:05,960
Speaker 2: and square away, like what is because it's it's it

681
00:39:06,080 --> 00:39:09,239
Speaker 2: would seem to say something different about each individual in

682
00:39:09,280 --> 00:39:10,839
Speaker 2: this relationship, you know.

683
00:39:11,440 --> 00:39:13,160
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean there could be a number of ways

684
00:39:13,200 --> 00:39:15,359
Speaker 3: to explain that. I kind of wonder, and I want

685
00:39:15,360 --> 00:39:17,440
Speaker 3: to be clear, I don't have special insight here. I'm

686
00:39:17,480 --> 00:39:21,160
Speaker 3: just kind of wondering. I wonder if that could be

687
00:39:21,239 --> 00:39:23,879
Speaker 3: just a function of liking that, Like if we think

688
00:39:23,960 --> 00:39:27,520
Speaker 3: authenticity is a desirable trait, that like good people who

689
00:39:27,560 --> 00:39:30,880
Speaker 3: are worthy of being liked or are authentic. As you

690
00:39:30,920 --> 00:39:33,720
Speaker 3: grow to like somebody more because you know them better,

691
00:39:34,200 --> 00:39:37,640
Speaker 3: you just naturally like it drags up all of their

692
00:39:37,680 --> 00:39:42,480
Speaker 3: positively associated traits in your estimation. And that would include authenticity,

693
00:39:42,480 --> 00:39:44,800
Speaker 3: which is actually something you have no insight into.

694
00:39:45,440 --> 00:39:48,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, and I guess you could. It could be

695
00:39:48,040 --> 00:39:50,919
Speaker 2: a certain amount of confirmation bias there too, Right, It's like, Okay,

696
00:39:50,920 --> 00:39:52,600
Speaker 2: you've reached a point where you like this person, and

697
00:39:52,640 --> 00:39:56,160
Speaker 2: therefore you encounter these various examples that you were just

698
00:39:56,200 --> 00:39:58,040
Speaker 2: gonna you're gonna hold up as oh, look, they're being

699
00:39:58,080 --> 00:40:01,160
Speaker 2: authentic there, And maybe you're gonna be more forgiving of

700
00:40:01,200 --> 00:40:06,879
Speaker 2: the moments that could be interpreted as as inauthentic if

701
00:40:06,920 --> 00:40:10,360
Speaker 2: you had a different mood or a different demeanor concerning

702
00:40:10,400 --> 00:40:13,279
Speaker 2: this person, you know, because on the other hand, someone

703
00:40:13,320 --> 00:40:16,080
Speaker 2: that you have already sort of prejudged as inauthentic and

704
00:40:16,080 --> 00:40:18,360
Speaker 2: maybe you don't like them, something about them rubs you

705
00:40:18,400 --> 00:40:21,120
Speaker 2: the wrong way. You might be on sort of hyper alert, like,

706
00:40:21,160 --> 00:40:25,839
Speaker 2: all right, what's Jimmy doing today? That's just fake his heck, well,

707
00:40:25,840 --> 00:40:28,160
Speaker 2: what's he wearing? Ah, I can't believe you thought he

708
00:40:28,160 --> 00:40:28,919
Speaker 2: could pull that off.

709
00:40:29,239 --> 00:40:33,279
Speaker 3: That seems highly plausible to me. Yeah, but let's see.

710
00:40:33,280 --> 00:40:37,160
Speaker 3: Should we call part one of our study of authenticity

711
00:40:37,200 --> 00:40:39,719
Speaker 3: there and come back and look at it some more

712
00:40:39,760 --> 00:40:42,759
Speaker 3: next time, maybe with explorations of authenticity and art and

713
00:40:42,880 --> 00:40:43,720
Speaker 3: music and film.

714
00:40:44,400 --> 00:40:47,800
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it'll well, it'll continue to be sort of

715
00:40:47,840 --> 00:40:52,120
Speaker 2: a quagmire though, trying to figure out what is authentic,

716
00:40:52,160 --> 00:40:55,680
Speaker 2: what isn't authentic, what is fake, and so forth. So, yeah,

717
00:40:55,680 --> 00:40:59,200
Speaker 2: we'll get into some discussions of music and art and

718
00:40:59,280 --> 00:41:01,640
Speaker 2: film and so forth, so we'll pick up with all

719
00:41:01,680 --> 00:41:04,600
Speaker 2: that on Thursday. Just a reminder to everybody that's Stuff

720
00:41:04,640 --> 00:41:07,200
Speaker 2: to Blow Your Mind is primarily a science and culture podcast,

721
00:41:07,200 --> 00:41:10,560
Speaker 2: with core episodes on Tuesdays and Thursdays, a short form

722
00:41:10,600 --> 00:41:14,160
Speaker 2: episode on Wednesdays, listener mail on Mondays, and on Fridays.

723
00:41:14,200 --> 00:41:16,319
Speaker 2: We set aside most serious concerns to just talk about

724
00:41:16,320 --> 00:41:19,200
Speaker 2: a weird film on Weird House Cinema.

725
00:41:19,640 --> 00:41:24,040
Speaker 3: Huge thanks to our guest producer today, Max Williams. Thanks

726
00:41:24,040 --> 00:41:27,160
Speaker 3: for stepping in. Max's a big help. If you would

727
00:41:27,200 --> 00:41:29,799
Speaker 3: like to get in touch with us with feedback on

728
00:41:29,800 --> 00:41:32,279
Speaker 3: this episode or any other, to suggest a topic for

729
00:41:32,360 --> 00:41:35,000
Speaker 3: the future, or just to say hello, you can email

730
00:41:35,080 --> 00:41:38,240
Speaker 3: us at contact at stuff to Blow your Mind dot COMTCT.

731
00:41:45,480 --> 00:41:48,400
Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For

732
00:41:48,480 --> 00:41:51,279
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733
00:41:51,440 --> 00:42:04,600
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734
00:42:04,239 --> 00:42:10,480
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