What does familiarity breeds contempt mean?

Friday, July 5, 2024.

Ever heard the phrase "familiarity breeds contempt"? According to psychologists, the more we know about someone, the less we might actually like them.

Surprising, right? Especially given how many of us are eternal optimists about forming new relationships.

Let's explore this phenomenon and understand why too much familiarity can sometimes lead to disappointment.

The Optimism of Forming New Relationships

Despite the potential for irritation, many of us remain hopeful when it comes to new relationships.

We seem naturally inclined to like others. This is where the 'mere exposure effect' comes into play—a robust finding in social psychology that suggests just being exposed to someone increases our liking for them.

The Mere Exposure Effect in Action

Consider the classic study by Moreland and Beach (1992). They introduced four fake students to a large college course. Each student, chosen to look similar, attended varying numbers of classes but didn’t interact with others. By the end of the course, the student who attended the most classes was the most liked, even though she never spoke to anyone. This demonstrates that mere exposure can indeed boost our liking for someone (Moreland & Beach, 1992).

Expectations vs. Reality

Intuitively, it seems that as we get to know more about others, we should like them more.

A study by Michael I. Norton and colleagues from Harvard Business School supports this intuitive understanding. When surveyed, 81% of online dating site members and 88% of undergraduate students preferred to know more about someone before liking them (Norton, Frost, & Ariely, 2007).

However, the reality is quite different.

Why Familiarity Breeds Contempt

In a detailed study, Norton and colleagues asked participants to evaluate a person based on a list of traits. Interestingly, the more traits participants knew, the less they liked the person. This was contrary to their expectations and highlighted a key issue: the more we know about someone, the more likely we are to find something we dislike.

The Role of Similarity

Norton’s team tested this further by having participants create lists of traits that described themselves, which were then mixed and randomly allocated to describe a 'real' person.

Despite the traits being generally positive, participants preferred shorter lists, indicating that knowing fewer details led to higher liking.

The reason? Dissimilarity. The more traits we know about someone, the more likely we are to find dissimilarities, which drive down our liking for them. This effect cascades, meaning an early negative trait can taint our perception of subsequent traits.

Real-World Implications

Testing this in the real world, researchers found that people’s liking for their dates decreased after meeting them, even though their knowledge increased. On average, participants' knowledge about their dates increased from 5/10 to 6/10 post-date, while their liking dropped from 7/10 to 5/10.

The Persistent Optimism

Despite these findings, we continue to meet new people, driven by optimism and the hope of forming meaningful connections. It's this hope that helps us remember the few times when deeper knowledge led to stronger bonds, rather than the many times it led to disappointment.

Challenging the Orthodoxy: Does familiarity really breed liking?

Imagine you're placed in a Big Brother-type house for a week with a random selection of people—not the narcissists they typically cast, but a real cross-section of society.

After a week, would you like these people more or less?

Traditionally, psychology textbooks tell us that familiarity breeds liking. If you hang around people long enough, you’re bound to discover common interests and develop a certain respect for them.

However, Norton and colleagues challenged this assumption with their study, finding that familiarity often breeds contempt.

They discovered that the more facts people knew about strangers, the more dissimilarities they found, leading to less liking. This is because we naturally assume others are similar to us until proven otherwise. When we find out they have different tastes or views, we tend to like them less (Norton, Frost, & Ariely, 2007).

The Controversial Theory

This finding was controversial. Reis et al. (2011) argued that Norton’s study didn't account for the nuances of live interactions.

Their study showed that when people interact face-to-face, they are likely to find mutual interests, leading to more liking. They argued that real interactions involve complex dynamics that can foster liking, even if initial dissimilarities exist (Reis, Maniaci, Caprariello, Eastwick, & Finkel, 2011).

Norton’s team, however, countered that Reis’ study used scenarios that naturally encouraged liking, such as the 'Relationship Closeness Induction Task.' They suggested that while Reis’ methods might show more liking, they weren't representative of typical, everyday interactions.

Motivation Matters

Ultimately, whether familiarity breeds liking or contempt depends on the situation and motivation.

When motivated, we can find reasons to like those we encounter, as cooperation is essential in society. However, without incentive, our focus on dissimilarities leads to less liking.

This is akin to Dr. Howard Markman’s findings that assuming your partner has a clean heart with good intentions is a prerequisite for relational health.

Norton’s finding that familiarity can breed contempt offers a counterpoint to the traditional view that mere exposure leads to liking. It suggests that while we might expect to like others more as we get to know them, the reality is often more complex.

Final thoughts

As Jean-Paul Sartre famously said, "Hell is other people." I’m sure that the teenage girls he forced himself upon concurred.

While this might be an overstatement, there's truth in it for most of us.

The more we learn about others, the more we realize how different they are from us, often leading to dislike. Yet, the few who break this pattern are the ones we hold dear, making it all worth the effort.

So next time you find yourself disillusioned by getting to know someone too well, remember it's a common experience.

And maybe, just maybe, that next person you meet will be one of those rare gems who doesn’t conform to the rule that familiarity breeds contempt.

Be Well, Stay Kind, and Godspeed.

REFERENCES:

Moreland, R. L., & Beach, S. R. (1992). Exposure effects in the classroom: The development of affinity among students. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 28(3), 255-276. doi:10.1016/0022-1031(92)90055-o

Norton, M. I., Frost, J. H., & Ariely, D. (2007). Less is more: The lure of ambiguity, or why familiarity breeds contempt. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92(1), 97-105.

Reis, H. T., Maniaci, M. R., Caprariello, P. A., Eastwick, P. W., & Finkel, E. J. (2011). Familiarity does indeed promote attraction in live interaction. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 101(3), 557-570.