286 Understanding Intuitive Decision Making
Similarity biases a wide range of audience decisions. Mock jurors are less likely to convict whenthey and the defendant have similar backgrounds, ethnicity, and beliefs.^368 Recruiters give higher
ratings to job applicants who have similar attitudes and characteristics.^369 Similarities between a
recruiter and a job applicant on demographic characteristics,^370 attitudes,^371 and experience^372 also
affect the likelihood that the applicant will be offered a job.
Studies of group decision making fi nd that as a group becomes more tight knit, the group’sevaluation of their leader’s effectiveness comes to depend less on the leader’s fi t with a generic leader
schema and more on the degree to which the leader is perceived to be prototypical of, or similar to,
the specifi c group’s membership.^373 Perhaps this bias explains why U.S. presidents who put greater
emphasis on their similarity to their followers are rated as more charismatic.^374
Audiences also like more and are more persuaded by professionals who exhibit nonverbal behav-iors similar to their own.^375 For example, people like conversational partners who mimic their
smiling behaviors more than partners who do not.^376 A conversational partner’s similar posture can
also lead to increased rapport.^377 Mimicking the audience’s behavior without their awareness causes
them to be more helpful,^378 and in service situations, to provide bigger tips.^379 In a negotiation,
vocal mirroring occurring within the fi rst fi ve minutes of the negotiation is highly predictive of
the negotiated outcome, with more mirroring leading to better outcomes for the negotiator doing
the mirroring.^380
The Salience Bias: The Persuasive Appeal of Standing Out
Attention-getting or salient professionals are more persuasive than those who do not attract atten-
tion. Members of group discussions see attention-getting or salient group members as intrinsically
persuasive. They may credit them with setting the tone of the meeting, deciding on topics to be
covered, or guiding the discussion.^381 When a speaker gains attention and becomes salient by deliv-
ering an unexpected message—for example, when a member of the Republican party advocates a
liberal policy—the persuasiveness of their message is amplifi ed.^382
In addition to being more persuaded by salient individuals, participants in meetings tend to viewsalient individuals as representing the group to which they belong. For example, a lone marketer in
a meeting of accountants is likely to be seen as presenting the “marketing” perspective. Audiences
will also exaggerate their evaluations of salient people. When a person is salient, audiences tend
to evaluate the person’s positive attributes more positively and to evaluate their negative attributes
more negatively than when the person does not attract as much attention.^383
Cognitive Centrality: The Power of Knowing What Others Know
Group members who possess more information shared by other group members (for a discussion
of shared information, see Chapter 5 , pp. 235–236), or who are more cognitively central, tend
to be more persuasive in group decision making than those who possess less shared informa-
tion.^384 A study of persuasive minority members fi nds that when the person in the minority in
a three-person group possesses the most shared information, the other group members agree with
their position 67% of the time.^385 When the person in the minority possesses the least amount
of shared information, the other group members agree with their position only 42% of the time.
Groups also tend to agree with the minority position when the person in the minority repeats more
shared information than is repeated by those in the majority.^386
Group members who possess more shared information tend to participate more in group dis-cussions, get more reactions from other group members, and agree more with the group’s decision
than those who possess mostly unshared information that only they possess.^387 Group members