What helps to understand others to be understood. “What helps us to better understand the other (representative of a different nationality, religion, other worldview positions)? ”

Researcher Robin Dunbar linked the activity of the neocortex, the main part of the cerebral cortex, with the level of social activity.

He looked at the size of social groups in different animals and the number of partners involved in grooming (an important part of courtship, for example, wool picking in primates).

It turned out that the size of the neocortex is directly related to the number of individuals in the community and the number of those who cleaned each other (analogous to communication).

When Dunbar began to study people, he found that social groups numbered about 150 people. This means that everyone has about 150 acquaintances whom he can ask for help or provide them with something.

The close group is 12 people, but 150 social connections is a larger figure. This is the maximum number of people we keep in touch with. If your number goes over 150, some of your past connections are gone.

It can be expressed in another way:

These are the people you wouldn't mind having a drink with at a bar if you happen to meet them there.

Writer Rick Lux tried to challenge Dunbar's theory. He wrote about trying to do this:

“In trying to challenge Dunbar's theory, I actually confirmed it. Even if you decide to disprove the Dunbar number and try to expand your circle of acquaintances, you will be able to interact with a large number of people, but this large number is just 200 people or even less.

This experience allowed Lux to draw attention to close connections:

“After my experiment, I came to respect:

1. British anthropology.

2. To my real friends.

I realized that there are not so many of them, but now I treat them much better and appreciate them more.

Dunbar's number is especially useful for marketers and people working in the field of social media and branding. If you know that each person can only interact with 150 friends and acquaintances, it will be easier to respond to rejection.

Instead of getting angry and frustrated when people don't want to connect with you and support your brand, consider that they only have 150 contacts. If they choose you, they have to give up someone they know. On the other hand, if people make contact, you will appreciate it more.

But what about where many have more than a thousand friends? But how many of them do you have any contact with? Most likely, the number of such people is close to 150. As soon as new contacts appear, the old ones are forgotten and just hang in your friends list.

Many periodically clean up their list and delete those with whom they will not communicate, leaving only close people. This is not entirely correct. The fact is that not only strong ties are important, that is, your immediate environment. Morten Hansen's book "Collaboration" describes how important weak social contacts (in particular, those that are made through social networks) are for a person. They are the key to new opportunities.

The study showed that it is not so much the number of connections that is important for human development, but their diversity. Among your acquaintances should be people who hold opposing points of view, with different experiences and knowledge. And such a contingent is quite possible to find in the social network.

Weak ties are useful because they take us into unfamiliar areas, while strong ties exist in areas already explored.

Hanlon's Razor

Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by stupidity.

In Hanlon's razor, instead of the word "stupidity", you can put "", that is, the lack of information before making a decision or any action. And here's how it works: when you feel like someone is treating you badly or doing something out of spite, first dig deeper and find out if this is not due to a banal misunderstanding.

For example, if you receive an email from an employee in which he strongly opposes your idea, it is possible that he simply did not understand its essence. And his indignation was not directed at you, he only opposed the proposal, which seemed to him stupid or dangerous.

In addition, it often happens that acquaintances try to help a person with their own methods, and he perceives this as vile intrigues. Humans are not inherently evil creatures, so behind every imaginary harm there may be good intentions, just ridiculously expressed.

Herzberg Motivational Factors

The latter theory can help in communicating with colleagues or even with friends and spouses. The concept was put forward in 1959 by Frederik Herzberg. Its essence lies in the fact that satisfaction and dissatisfaction with work are measured in different ways, not being two ends of the same straight line.

In theory, it is assumed that dissatisfaction depends on hygienic factors: working conditions, salary, relations with superiors and colleagues. If they are not satisfied, there is dissatisfaction.

But the work is not liked because of good hygiene factors. Satisfaction depends on a group of reasons (motivation), which include: pleasure from the work process, recognition and opportunities for growth.
We can deduce the following statement: working on with comfortable conditions, you can still feel lousy if, for example, you are not trusted with serious projects and do not notice the efforts.

And the fact that you get recognition and realize the benefits of your actions will not make up for the fact that you are paid pennies for this, forcing you to work in a terrible environment.

This theory is especially useful to those who are responsible for personnel in the company. Now it will be clear to you why people, despite good conditions, still quit.

For those who themselves are dissatisfied with their work, this theory will help to find out the cause of dissatisfaction and overcome it. And also, if your friends, relatives or acquaintances complain about the place of employment, you will never tell them: “But you are paid so well there! You're pissed off with fat, stay." This step can be very important for their future.

"The point of view depends on the point of sitting."

Have you ever seen how your loved ones quarrel? Agree that your feeling and the story of how it all happened can be very different from what its participants actually felt. Our perception of reality is highly dependent on the angle of view. This fact is well known to all.

It is on it that one of the important NLP techniques, which is called "", is based. Using it, we can consider any situation from all sides: with our own eyes, "get into the shoes" of another person and with the eyes of an outside observer. When changing positions, we can quickly learn understand others people and get additional tools for quick and effective interaction.

And although each of us knows how to do this, at the same time, we tend to “hang” for a long time in a preferred position of perception. While good communicators use all three with ease. One important mechanism by which this occurs is association and dissociation.

1 POSITION OF PERCEPTION

"I - position" is the territory of our personal experience, which refers to the state of "Here and Now". In it, we have the richest sensory experience, and can clearly answer questions:

What do I like or dislike?

What do I want?

How do I think to achieve something?

In "I-position" we are in the most associated state. And focused solely on their own values.

At the same time, this position is inherently selfish, since in it we always give ourselves the first place.

And she is often "cut off from reality." The expressions "walk in circles", "beat your head against the wall" are just about people who get stuck in it. In "I - position" we often fantasize and project our feelings and thoughts onto others. We present our guesses and assumptions as reality.

Almost like this joke:

A man and a woman are lying in bed. The man looks at the ceiling and is silent.
Thoughts of a woman: "Why is he silent? Probably out of love? I feel: he has a different one!"
Thoughts of a man: "A fly .... I wonder how it still keeps on the ceiling?"

2 POSITION OF PERCEPTION

This is also an associated position. But being in it, we are very good at reading the thoughts and feelings of other people. Our focus is on the partner's values. People with the second position of perception tend to empathize and understand others. The "reverse side of the coin" is that the needs of other people are always more important than their own. Often such a person forgets about himself, or his environment does not allow him to do this.

If a person in the "I - position" learns to get up from time to time in the 2nd position of perception, this will help him better understand the motives of other people's actions and behave less selfishly.

3 POSITION OF PERCEPTION

This is the position of "included observer". In it, a person is dissociated, and looks at the situation a little detached. Emotions are preserved, but not as pronounced as in the first position.

Position 3 example: Your boss scolds you for a job well done. If you move into the position of "included observer", you can look at it "through the eyes of another person". So it will be easier for you to notice: how you look from the side.

Once in the third position, you can always give good advice to yourself.

The advantage of this position is that it allows you to develop a different attitude towards what is happening or what you are going to do. In this position, your "inner sage" helps you, who will give good advice to your "I". You will quickly be able to understand what the other person is coming from, how it can be connected to your point of view and see alternative options.

Imagine that the two of you are building Lego, but blindly, without seeing the end result. Is it easy? The third position will give you the full picture.

Our learning of something also comes from different positions of perception. In martial arts, a transition from the 1st to the 2nd position is accepted, when the student repeats after the master, trying to reproduce all movements as accurately as possible. The same way children use, imitating the behavior of adults.

This can be seen when a small baby with a preoccupied look pushes a stroller with a doll in front of him, feeling like a mother.

In their games, children easily master the second position, reincarnating either as a doctor, or as a fireman, or as a singer. This is the process of unconscious modeling. By the way, children learn language in the same way. We, as adults, almost always learn a language using the transition from 1st to 3rd position: first we learn the rules and memorize the words, and then we try to put them into practice. The inefficiency of this approach is clearly visible: we have been studying a foreign language for years, and still cannot begin to speak it.

The ability to quickly move into different positions of perception and use them correctly gives us many advantages in life.

Very often, people cannot get out of a state of conflict just because each of them remains exclusively in the “I - position”: spouses dividing property after a divorce, a subordinate and a boss who cannot find a compromise solution in any way, friends whose quarrel dragged on for years.

The husband returns home after a difficult, stressful day with the only desire: "Relax and be silent!". He is met by his wife, a housewife who has no one to talk to for the whole day. Having fed him, she hopes for some kind of communication (or, at least, for words of gratitude for caring). When she repeatedly does not receive attention, her resentment grows larger.And there comes a point when she can't stand it.

Mom calls her son from a walk. He plaintively asks for permission to finish playing an interesting game, but receives a categorical answer: "Hurry home! Dinner is getting cold!" A frustrated child leaves his friends with regret and eats cooked food without appetite.

If close relatives tend to take the first position all the time, then conflicts are inevitable in such a family.

The best option is when a person can take the position of another, and then explain in the correct form: why he did it, and that he expects the same attitude from his partner.

If a person simply adjusts all the time, and does not say anything at the same time, then the feeling "that he is being used", "his interests are not taken into account" will grow. And then, the explosion is inevitable.

In families in which they are able to consider situations from all 3 positions of perception, warmer and more trusting relationships develop towards each other. And their children are better adapted to adulthood.

So the question is: How to learn to understand others?" just doesn't work for them.

Researcher Robin Dunbar linked the activity of the neocortex, the main part of the cerebral cortex, with the level of social activity.

He looked at the size of social groups in different animals and the number of partners involved in grooming (an important part of courtship, for example, wool picking in primates).

It turned out that the size of the neocortex is directly related to the number of individuals in the community and the number of those who cleaned each other (analogous to communication).

When Dunbar began to study people, he found that social groups numbered about 150 people. This means that everyone has about 150 acquaintances whom he can ask for help or provide them with something.

It can be expressed in another way:

These are the people you wouldn't mind having a drink with at a bar if you happen to meet them there.

Writer Rick Lux tried to challenge Dunbar's theory. He wrote about trying to do this:

This experience allowed Lux to draw attention to close connections:

“After my experiment, I came to respect:

1. British anthropology.

2. To my real friends.

I realized that there are not so many of them, but now I treat them much better and appreciate them more.

Weak ties are useful because they take us into unfamiliar areas, while strong ties exist in areas already explored.

Hanlon's Razor

Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by stupidity.

Herzberg Motivational Factors

In theory, it is assumed that dissatisfaction depends on hygienic factors: working conditions, salary, relations with superiors and colleagues. If they are not satisfied, there is dissatisfaction.

And the fact that you get recognition and realize the benefits of your actions will not make up for the fact that you are paid pennies for this, forcing you to work in a terrible environment.

This theory is especially useful to those who are responsible for personnel in the company. Now it will be clear to you why people, despite good conditions, still quit.

Understanding is the main key to success in human relationships. If a marriage breaks up, conflicts occur at work, communication with friends or relatives stops, we usually say that understanding has disappeared. This means that two people for some reason moved away from each other or hostility arose between them. How to avoid this and learn to understand loved ones?

What does it mean to understand a person

How to understand another person

To learn to understand other people, make it a rule not to perceive events and phenomena only through the prism of your own views and beliefs. Sometimes it can be very difficult, if you are still able to understand one person, then the other is a complete mystery to you due to differences in opinion.

How to understand that a person is lying

It is quite difficult to immediately understand whether a person is telling the truth or not. He can lie selflessly and quite convincingly, but his gestures, facial expressions and manner of speech will betray him sooner or later. Knowing about some psychological tricks and methods, you can easily expose a liar.

Look closely at the interlocutor, his eyes can tell about his sincerity. Psychologists believe that if a person in a conversation with you raises his eyes up, then he remembers something, that is, he refers to visual memory. But moving the gaze to the right and down indicates an internal monologue and careful selection of words. Body language is very important here, twitching the shoulder or leg, stepping back, lifting the chin - all this is also an alarm signal.
It is possible to expose a deceiver by watching him. A person can tell something with interest and gesticulate, trying to captivate you, and at the same time shake his head from side to side, as if disagreeing with himself. Other signs of lying are regular touching of the lips, neck and nose, folding fingers into the lock, stroking one hand with the other (a gesture of self-soothing).
Trying to mislead, the interlocutor often deviates from the main topic and talks about all sorts of nonsense, stretching time and wondering whether to tell the truth. Ask him a direct question, most likely, he will be confused and confess to deception.
To find out the information you need, do not warn the person that the conversation will take place. Go beyond the standard scenario, ask the same unexpected questions, periodically change their wording.
Never lay out everything that you know at once, use leading questions, when there is enough information, you can compare it with the information you know.

Greetings, my dears! It is among people and it is impossible not to communicate with them. Is it possible to make this communication comfortable, pleasant and useful? Can. But how can this be achieved? Today I want to tell you how to learn to understand people, human psychology, body language, how not to get lost in someone else's subconscious and where to start.

To a foreign monastery without its charter

The first and most important rule - do not impose your opinion on other people. You should not try to convince others, explain their wrongness, insist on your truth. Remember one simple thing - each person has his own truth. Let's take a look at an example.

Masha doesn't like rain very much, because it ruins her hairstyle, which she spends a huge amount of time on. And Petya waits every time for rain, like manna from heaven, because he is engaged in gardening.

And when Masha meets Petya and they start talking about the weather, they always quarrel because of their different attitudes towards rain. Petya tries to convince Masha that the rain is wonderful, and Masha is the opposite.

All our “I want, I can, I wish” are different from others. If you understand that each person looks at things from his own special angle, then you will understand the pointlessness of disputes, you will begin to understand people better, start listening to them.

It is our view of things that prevents us from better understanding others. Each person has their own experience, set of knowledge and situations. If you learn to put it aside, try to look at the story through the eyes of the interlocutor, then there will be much more understanding between you.

I bring to your attention the book of Eric Berne " People who play games. Games People Play". In it you will find examples of various stories and situations that will help you understand why people you know and others do the way they do.

Pantomime

Is it possible to learn to understand people by their gestures? Easy. This requires some effort on your part, but nothing is impossible. Does it happen to you that you feel what your friend is thinking without further ado? Or do you understand by the eyes what your loved one wants to say?

Often our body communicates much more information to others than our speech. When you look at a speaker, by what signs do you understand that he is worried, nervous? Or an unconscious feeling that the interlocutor is lying to you. Where does it come from?

To get started, I suggest you read the article "". In it you will find the basic poses, learn to distinguish between nervousness and shyness, and you will become better at understanding the sincere benevolence of a person.

Watch yourself and your gestures. Sometimes introspection is a great help in understanding other people. Notice in what situations you take closed poses. Try mirroring. The interlocutor feels great sympathy for the person who is sitting in the same position as him. Only it should be unobtrusive and invisible.

When you learn to understand a little about gestures and facial expressions, then Alan and Barbara Pease's book will come in handy. New body language". In it you will find a huge number of examples, explanations and explanations.

Remember that it is not always possible to correctly understand a person with just one gesture. Try to look at the situation as a whole, look for additional little things that will help you pick up all the puzzles of the person’s image.

labyrinth

Sometimes it can be difficult to understand your own thoughts, let alone other people. Very often I hear the phrase: I do not understand my loved one; I want to communicate easily and naturally, but everything rests on misunderstanding.
To make communication pleasant and comfortable,

try not to teach others life,
do not give unnecessary advice, especially when it is not asked,
do not insist on being right (reread the first part of the article),
do not ask unnecessary and inappropriate questions,
do not put the person in an uncomfortable position.

It all comes down to the fact that you need to be welcoming and friendly. I discuss this topic in more detail in the article "". Agree, it is always nice to communicate with a person who smiles, friendly and benevolent.

In the article "" I talk about several tricks that help get your way from any person. These techniques perfectly show how people react in a given situation. This will greatly help you in understanding human psychology.

What skills help you communicate with people? Are you able to immediately determine that you are lying?

Learn to see the beauty in people. All the best!