02/02/2024
No, the audience is not like you.
Because a discussion on this can easily digress into philosophy, let’s refrain from diving too deeply into the relation between the speaker and the listener here – but as a baseline, if you think you have a lot in common with your audience: As a part of the very definition of public speaking, there is a fundamental difference between speaking and listening. The barrier between the active, public individual and the passive, anonymous group is exactly what we try to breach when we speak.
In the attempt to connect with our audiences, we often make the very risky mistake of assuming that they are just like us – which of course, to some extent is true. But due to the nature of the situation alone, you are most likely not like your audience.
The social projection bias or the egocentric bias (almost, but not quite the same - the discussion is ongoing) is the natural next place to move the spotlight after the fundamental attribution error and the consistency bias.
The egocentric bias is the tendency to think and believe that other people think like us, would do like us, and share the same emotions around the values that mean something to us. When we think about it, we instinctively know this not to be true, but when we make quick, heuristic decisions based on intuition, we act as if it was.
In fact, many speakers plan their presentations, their means, and their effects as if the audience has the same experience level, the same references, the same understandings, the same values and the same interests as themselves.
Obviously, this is only very rarely the case. Even in a very homogenous group, these assumptions come with a risk of transgressing cultural and social borders, or at the very least create noise in the messaging. In other words, for most people it takes an active effort to overcome the egocentric bias and understand your audience from the inside – but interviews, tag-alongs and research can bring you very far.
Understanding your audience does not come free, it will take legwork and empathy, but the connection you will be able to create is deeper, more credible and will elicit larger effect.
(Image: If we could see all the assumptions, we project to our audiences, maybe it would look like this beautiful stage performance piece. Considering every individual in the audience, with how they differ from your ideas, interests and experiences, as a relation you create when speaking, the complexity quickly becomes enormous.
Image credit: From the performance “Hakanai” by Adrien M & Claire B, next show at time of posting: Théatre André Malraux, Paris, France, February 10, 2024.)
