That Popular Podcast
What makes everyone like him so easily? Why does she bug me so much? Why are they so weird? Why do I always do that? Why do I always let that person make me feel that way?
Aaron is a multi-award winning radio host and Mitch is a psych professor, previously the Chief Science Officer for the American Psychological Association. Together, they talk about the social stuff we all experience, why it happens, and what it tells us about ourselves. It's light, interesting, and fun. It's That Popular Podcast.
That Popular Podcast
That Secret Trick To Turn a First Meeting into a Lifelong Relationship
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In the first 10 minutes of two people meeting for the first time, we can predict whether people will become best friends vs. somewhat friendly vs. rarely interact again. What do you do when you meet someone new? How easy is it for you to turn a new acquaintanceship into a very close friendship?
It's That Popular Podcast. Mitch Princetine is a psychology professor at UNC Chapel Hill and the former Chief Science Officer at the American Psychological Association. Aaron Keck is a political scientist and award-winning radio host. Together, they discuss the popular and not so popular quirks of human behavior. Welcome into That Popular Podcast. Now, here's Mitch and Aaron.
SPEAKER_01Hello, Mitch. How's it going? I'm doing okay. How are you doing? I am doing good. I'm doing good. My uh my husband and I just celebrated an anniversary, which is awesome.
SPEAKER_03What anniversary?
SPEAKER_01It is our ninth uh eighth anniversary of uh eighth anniversary of our wedding.
SPEAKER_03Wow. Oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_01I went back and forth on eight and nine because we actually have two anniversaries. We have the we have the anniversary of when we were legally married for insurance purposes, which was six months before our actual like we're doing the ceremony and going through the process of actually getting married in front of our friends and family and loved ones. Oh wow. So of course we celebrate both. Yeah, of course. Why not? Yeah.
SPEAKER_03And do you celebrate the day that you first met?
SPEAKER_01We don't celebrate the day we first met. We celebrate the day we started like going out, like the day we officially launched our relationship.
SPEAKER_03Wait, wait. Was there like a proclamation like we are officially going out today? Or was it like a date?
SPEAKER_01Or it wasn't a date. It wasn't a date. Okay. So if you ask, if you ask Brad, it was a date. Like he made plans to like hang out with me with the intention of starting a relationship. But we had known each other for several years before, and we had just sort of kind of organically been building up, building up to starting a relationship. So when when the moment actually happened, like it wasn't a date, it wasn't like a proclamation, it just sort of happened organically. And I've been really lucky. Like that's been the case with all of the relationships that I've ever had. Like it never started with a date date. It always was just I met someone, we were hanging out, we were friends, we started hanging out more because we liked each other more, and just gradually like built up to the point where okay, we're pulling the trigger and starting a relationship.
SPEAKER_03Wait a minute. So the day that Brad was officially going out with you on a date, what did you think you were doing that day?
SPEAKER_01Oh, I kind of knew. Okay. I knew. I I knew. Because we had built up to this point where like we are we are going out with the intention that at the end of this night it's going to be an official relationship thing. But we were already pretty much there at that point.
SPEAKER_03Aaron Ross Powell But you're saying these other ones all kind of like evolved. They were just like, we're hanging out, we're friends, and suddenly we're more than friends. Exactly.
SPEAKER_01I was talking with a coworker of mine recently who is on the dating scene and not enjoying it because dating sucks. And I was reflecting on like my own personal experience, and I've had three significant relationships in my life. All three of them have started organically, like no dating dating period. Really? Like no period of going out on dates with the intention of, oh, are we going to start a relationship? It just all kind of evolved organically without thinking about it. And the number of people that I have been conscious about, like I want to date this person. I want to go out with them to see if a relationship can develop. I'm going to ask you to go out on a date. Complete batting zero. Oh my God. All through my life, like maybe five people in my life I've I've been in that position with where I've wanted to go out on dates with them. I managed to make it out on dates with two of them, and neither of them went anywhere. Like my dating batting average is literally zero.
SPEAKER_03This is surprising. You're a very sociable guy. Like I would imagine the dating scene to be comfortable.
SPEAKER_01Terrible. Oh my god. Absolutely terrible. And that's that's that's real life. That's dating apps. Like I was terrible on the dating apps, like never got anywhere on those. Even in real life, like just meeting people and oh, do you want to go out? Zero success at all.
SPEAKER_03Wow. Oh my God. I had the exact opposite. So I well, for five years, I was in New Haven. I was finally done with school and I was at my first job. And I was looking for a Jewish woman, and there's an app called J Date, just for Jewish people or people who claim to be Jewish, it turns out. And um Yeah, that's interesting. But um, when you're in New Haven, it's interesting because like a tractor beam, all the Jewish women get sucked into Manhattan. So like you have to be in the Manhattan scene. So and I luckily I had a friend who is just very, very into J Date and would teach me you have to log in at 459. Well, actually, first of all, 1159, 459, because the profiles come up in order of most recently logged in, and you want to be on the top. Okay. So I would do that, and then I would go to people get done with work at five o'clock.
SPEAKER_01They log in and you've logged in a minute before, right?
SPEAKER_03Well, I'm done with work, let's find a date for tonight or something like that. But so I would I this is this is gonna sound horrible, but like I would set up like a Friday night date and a Saturday night date and a Sunday brunch date, and I would drive down or take the train down from New Haven to Manhattan, do like three dates, you know, stay in a food town in my friend's apartment, and like and then go back up.
SPEAKER_01And this just became like a jury second job that you had.
SPEAKER_03Oh my God, hundreds and hundreds. I I actually once I had a date with this one woman on Friday night at this place that apparently Central Perk for Friends was kind of modeled after.
SPEAKER_04Okay.
SPEAKER_03And we were there, so we had a like coffee date. And then the next day I had another date with a different woman for brunch, like about 20 blocks downtown. And the tables at these brunch places are so close together. I sit down with Saturday woman at the table, and sitting at the table right next to us, which is one inch from my shoulder, is Friday Coffee Date Woman. Oh. And it was like, oh my God, this is like, how is this possible? There are millions of people in Manhattan. Like, so very much the opposite experience.
SPEAKER_01That's that's terrific. Was there like the Friday train from New Haven to Manhattan and the Sunday train back? Was that like the love commute? Was there other people like on this?
SPEAKER_03There were a bunch of sad single guys with arrow beds over their backpacks, like all like, yeah, we're going to find someone. No, it's just it's crazy. And this is when sex in the city was really big. So Manhattan was like people's identity. And I was like, Yeah, I'm I'm kind of from New Haven, but you know, you you kind of hid that a little bit because Do you hide that a little bit?
SPEAKER_01I assume you were at Yale, right? Were you not at Yale?
SPEAKER_03I was, but if you're not from that point, I mean, no, if I mean just being 20 blocks away made you geographically undesirable in Manhattan. So interestingly, I found out a few things, both from these thousands of dates, but also in the research about kind of what what makes these things work. And it's just really crazy because there's all this stuff, and it's not just for dating, but it's actually in any kind of relationship, there's this fascinating thing called social mimicry. And it's this idea, and they've actually done most of the research on speed dating. Have you ever done speed dating? Well, you've never done speed dating. But I know there are people out there where the bell rings, you you you move over one chair and you have to start all over again.
SPEAKER_01And that said, my dates did start and end pretty quickly.
SPEAKER_03So, in a matter of speaking, right? So you you might have been unofficially speed dating, whether you knew it or not. No, I mean, actually, someone was just talking to me about they were on a speed date and they were listening to the person sitting next to them rather than the woman sitting across from them. And they ended up marrying the woman sitting caddy cornered to them rather than like so but anyway. So the social mimicry, the idea is it's so interesting. If you walk into a situation and you're particularly like energetic and happy and whatever, it doesn't matter what you say, it doesn't matter what you look like, it does the other person starts to suddenly feel like, huh, I don't know. I kind of feel happy in the situation, I kind of feel good. And the same thing in speed dating, they found that when they put in fake people, like you know, people that were not actually part of the experiment to act a little bit like sad and down, and then they did mood ratings, the people afterwards unwittingly were like, I don't know, there's just something where I feel a little bit like down, I just feel a little bit more pessimistic. So it's like I think the way we talk about it colloquially is people will say, I don't know, I just have like a good energy, or I just get some good vibe when I'm but what's actually happening is that we are mimicking what the other person is doing.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_03And we start to feel and act like they do.
SPEAKER_01Okay. But is that the case for everyone that we interact with? Because when people say I have good energy or good vibes with this person, they're saying I have good energy and good vibes with this specific person. Like we were on each other's wavelength to a to a greater degree than I am with other people.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, there's some sort of an interesting thing. Like I personally feel there's a sweet spot of what mood you're in right now, and that can that can vary from like a three to a seven, right? So you're not gonna sit down with someone and be like, all of a sudden I'm a 10 of happiness and energy, but like you're a little bit malleable within a range, and someone can kind of push and move you a little bit in that range. Whereas other people you might feel, I'm just so feeling disconnected or not in the vibe with that person right now that I don't care what they're like, I might even feel the opposite to them. But there was one study that was really interesting. They had um undergraduates sit down and talk with people who were elderly.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_03Um, not for dating, obviously. And and then uh and then afterwards they measured how long it took for the undergraduates to walk back across the room and leave the experiment. And as compared to when they interacted with people closer to their own age, people would actually walk more slowly as they left the room after they talked with the elderly, and they kind of concluded that this was part of this mimicry idea.
SPEAKER_01That's interesting.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. So I I've had that. I kind of on dates, I've kind of been, I was like, I don't know, I like who I am with this person. Somehow it brings out the part of me that feels more like casual and laid back and funny, or another one would be like, I don't know, so serious and so like deep that I don't want to be that person in a relationship. Right, right.
SPEAKER_01It is very interesting because there are people, and we talk about this with friends too. Like there are people, I think everyone has this experience where you've got people in your life who you're really close with, but maybe distance-wise, you're separated from each other, you don't see each other for months or years at a time. Yeah. And then when you reconnect, you can pick up the conversation right where you left off, and it's as if the the time hadn't passed at all. And there are other people that you might be very close with and interact with on a regular basis that you're just you don't have the you don't click in the same way, you don't connect to that same degree, which is the same.
SPEAKER_03Well, and for me, the people in that former category are the ones that I consider my closest friends. Exactly. You know, if I feel really like, oh my god, I'm zapped back to, you know, it's as if no time passed. Like, but I I my friends are in different buckets. I have my like talk to about serious things, but I might never go hang out with them. Right, you know, and like have fun. But boy, can we pour our hearts out to each other and really talk about like deep, scary stuff. But then I have people that I might hang out with and be like, I would never have a real conversation with you, but it's sure fun to like hang out at a party and just talk and joke. Like, and I think that that's also some of the same thing. Like, what are they bringing out in you? And I don't think you'd want all of one or all of the other. I think you need a variety of those kinds of relationships.
SPEAKER_01So when it comes to relationships, like what is it that what is it that makes people connect with each other in like a relationship way? Like how do you how do you establish that or how do you how do you how do you how do you tell or how fast can you tell that this is a person that I'm gonna sp spend time with like in that level?
SPEAKER_03Oh yeah, there's actually research on that too, which is so interesting because um so what they did was they looked, and actually these are with younger people, but the same thing holds for adults. So they actually videotaped interactions of people all meeting each other for the first time for less than an hour. And then at the end of So speed dating can work. Speed dating can work, okay. And then at the end of the school year, they looked at which of these kids, none of whom knew each other at the first day of school, which of these kids were really, really close friends and which were not and which were even enemies. And they were able to predict from what happened in the first hour which kids would be best friends uh, you know, at the end of the school year, nine months later. And this works for adults too. And it's kind of it kind of makes sense in a way when you think about it. But the thing that's so important to do is asking tons of questions because you're trying to find common ground. And if you think about it, when you first meet somebody, especially as adults, there's like this where do you work and where are you from? And what you know, but that whole thing, that whole dance is like I'm looking for something that can launch into a bigger conversation. You know, oh wait, you're from New York? I'm from New York, which part, you know?
SPEAKER_01And then 20 blocks away, get out of here.
SPEAKER_03You know, yeah, don't ever speak to me again. But then when you have that connection, you kind of are testing out these little paths. Like, okay, are we gonna go down that path of, oh, we both are from the same hometown and are we gonna hit dead ends? Or are we gonna find something to latch on to? Wait a minute, I used to go to that same mall, or wait, I was on the baseball team too. We might have played each other. Or, oh yeah, you spent a lot of time doing that. Yeah, I didn't. I hated that. And then it's like, okay, go back to the questions and so you kind of retreat and you go back to the questions part and then you're like searching, searching, searching, and then you try and find another lead. And the the whole thing is people that are really good at spontaneously finding inroads, new paths. You know, okay, there's a question. I can connect to that question somehow. I can find something we have in common. They're the most successful.
SPEAKER_01Interesting.
SPEAKER_03I could see that. Do you do that? Like, do you when you meet you're interviewing people constantly, more professional, but still you're meeting so many people. Like, how much does that how much is that part of what you do?
SPEAKER_01So that's part of my question because I interview people for a living, like two, three people a day, because that's just the the the radio show that I host. I talk to people on a regular basis, wide variety of folks in the community. And there are some people who come in and sit down for a conversation, and to me, it feels like pulling teeth to get any connection with them at all. And other people come in and sit down for a conversation, and I don't know what we're going to talk about. Like I've got usually a couple of bullet points, like, I'll ask about this, I'll ask about this, and we'll just see where it goes. And then 15 minutes later, we're off on a completely different track of a conversation that I didn't anticipate, and we're going back and forth and we're having a great time. Yeah. And I don't know what it is about me and the other person and how we connect with each other that makes that conversation more flowy and has more of a rapport going than this other conversation. Well, you know, in this case, it's not just me. Like I do this for a living, but there are some people that I don't connect with and others that I do.
SPEAKER_03But people are walking into this room f feeling a little bit nervous because you're a professional host and they are probably not on the radio every day, and they're probably looking for some clues, cues like, am I doing okay? Am I am I succeeding at this? And then you're probably verbally and non-verbally giving them a sense of like, oh, I'm enjoying this. This is going well. Let's go off on a tangent. Or like, okay, you're you're not answering my questions, and now you're pissing me off a little bit.
SPEAKER_01It's also my job to make them feel comfortable and feel like they're doing a good job, even when internally I am seething. I've had those conversations before too, where someone will just go off for a minute and a half on some other thing and not answer my question. And I'm hating every second of it, but I'm smiling and nodding and oh yeah, no, you're this is great. This is great. I am gonna edit so much of this later.
SPEAKER_03But you're you're very good at it, right? So I mean you you are probably conveying that in a very successful way to people, but in like a normal day-to-day situation, or if you meet somebody at a dinner party, like it is interesting if you if you really look at what's happening in a conversation, there's a lot of little test balloons that you're sending out. Like, I'm gonna try and make a little bit of a joke. Like, and I'm gonna see. If they like look at you like, wait, what? Humor? I'm confused. Like, then you're gonna be like, oh, okay, like a parameter has just been put around this conversation, like we have to stay serious. And then you might be like, okay, I'm bored. I don't want to be serious right now. You know, this is not fitting my vibe. On the other hand, if someone makes a joke and it goes a little bit too far, maybe it's slightly inappropriate, it can go the other way. Like, oh, okay, huh? I'm gonna get another drink. Like, you know, and just kind of so I think there's a lot of that interesting testing out. And the people that are most successful are the ones super adaptable, like, oh, we're going there. All right, I'll go there. We're going there, yeah.
SPEAKER_04You know, yeah.
SPEAKER_03Where but some people are more rigid. They're like, my comfort zone is really narrow. And we're gonna talk about this serious topic, and I have no tolerance for joking about it. I have no interest in kind of changing the subject. I'm I'm in this lane.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_03And then you're like, oh, okay, I'm kind of looking over your shoulder to see who might interrupt this conversation so I can't.
SPEAKER_01And it's different people feeling different ways at different times, too. I've done research on laughter and humor and comedy. Yeah. And one of the things that comes out of the research is whether you find something funny has a little bit to do with what frame of mind you're in in that given moment. Like, are you in a mood to laugh? Are you in a mood to be playful and think about things in a comic way, or are you in serious mode, in which case someone tells a joke and it's gonna rub you the wrong way? Five hours later, you might be talking to the same person, they say the same thing, but you're in a different frame of mind, so you're fine with it. Yeah. And if you had that initial conversation five hours later, you'd be best friends. Yeah, yeah. But if you have it five hours earlier, you don't click and that establishes everything from going forward.
SPEAKER_03A hundred percent. 100%. So that's the thing. I mean, think about it. When you walk into a new work environment or into a meeting with people that you've never met before, a client or a, you know, a brand new coworker, or you walk into a dinner party or something like that. What are you thinking when you walk in? Like, oh, this is gonna suck. I'm gonna have a horrible time. I didn't want to come tonight. I guarantee that person is walking in, not amenable to a joke or whatever. They're giving off, even nonverbally, some sort of like uh standoffish, you know.
SPEAKER_01Um, or like I don't know, Tony and Maria didn't want to go to that dance and then they saw each other across the hall.
SPEAKER_03That's right. Well, yeah, exactly. What is the way you're making that? But like, no, but and other ones you go in, you're like, yeah, whatever. I'm feeling fun tonight, and I'm up for whatever, and I'm up for meeting people and I'm feeling relaxed. This is what happens when you meet people who are like famous and stuff too, is people usually get really bottled up and nervous, yep, and they're kind of really scared. But it's very, it's very fun for them, like when you're like, yeah, you're a person just like everybody else, and I'm gonna make a joke with you, like just like everybody else, and you're gonna feel a little bit like, oh, you're not brittle around me. You're actually kind of okay talking with me, like I can be myself with you. And then people later, this happens in interview situations later, uh, as well. People are like, oh my God, that didn't feel transactional. It just felt like we connected, like we clicked. And it's like, oh yeah, because you came looking to interact with me with whoever I was, and I came looking to interact with you, everyone is. We weren't playing our scripts. Like you weren't asking me to say the right answer or to be formal in the situation. I think it's I think it's if you want that social mimicry, it's about and you want that like quick connection. It's about asking questions, being flexible, going with where the conversation goes. If they take it to a different tone, can you adapt to that? Maybe you don't want to, that's cool. But if you want to connect with them, and then like just being aware of here are the presuppositions and assumptions that I'm making coming in, and maybe try to challenge those and let go of them. Be like, I'm gonna come in being like, whatever. Let's see what happens. I'm totally flexible in this moment.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And the questions can be whatever. I was talking with Kurt Gray, I think it was, who was a UNC guy. I think he's at Ohio State now. He had written a really cool book called Outraged, and he was talking about like how do you establish rapport with people, ask questions, but don't ask, don't necessarily ask the generic inter questions, you know, where do you work, what do you do? Go deeper. Uh his example was when was the last time you cried? Which was which is not something you can easily slip into a conversation.
SPEAKER_03If someone asked me that a dinner party, I would be looking for that kind of thing.
SPEAKER_01Because you can you can build a conversation based on that too. Not just like what do you do, what you know, sports teams do you like?
SPEAKER_03Or well, I'd also say shared experiences.
SPEAKER_01Shared experiences, right? Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Oh my God, did you see that thing that happened yesterday in the news? So it's like, okay, we are both now sharing our feelings about that other thing together. Right. And that immediately creates a bonding thing.
SPEAKER_01Oh man.
SPEAKER_03As opposed to like, oh, tell me factually this information about you. And it's like, okay, well, it's just about me, so you're not going to share in that.
SPEAKER_01But of course, now we're in a world where shared culture is harder to come by because you don't have three channels anymore, you have a thousand. No, I know. So it's harder for people to click with those shared experiences.
SPEAKER_03Well, and these days, with everything going on in the world, there's a lot of testing, like, oh yeah, did you hear the news? Pause, let's go. And what do you think about it? Yeah. Oh, am I seeing your facial expression turn to like pale white and you know, or and but there but I think a lot of that it's and it's hard. I will say that like some people are more introverted, some people are more in their head, and it it's hard to do all these things. So also there's the difference of are you standing in a circle of like five different people and you're trying to have a conversation with all of them? Or are do you succeed with like quietly taking one person aside or just standing and just having that more one on one slow conversation? Either way is fine. But I know it's really scary for some people to be like, oh, I'm at the dinner table and I'm telling a story and everyone's listening to the story, and I can't be flexible and cool and having whatever vibe, like I'm petrified.
SPEAKER_01And so last thing, if it is the case that we can Predict in the first hour of a conversation or an interaction with someone whether we're going to be best friends or eventual lovers six months down the road. Does that mean love at first sight is like a real thing?
SPEAKER_03That's really interesting. I mean, I know there are people that study that, but I obviously there's like a lot of attraction there and stuff too. But when it comes to actually the non-sexual part of it, you know, I do think there's that sense of two people just being so easily, like their default vibe is the one that just happens to fit the other one. And it's like, this just feels easy and comfortable. I'm not having to try. We're we are both in the same mindset right away. And it's just fun. And I think that's that's a really great thing to look for.
SPEAKER_00This has been That Popular Podcast. Find all our episodes on that popularpodcast.com or wherever you get your podcasts.
