Scientific Definition
We favor people who are similar to us or who like us.
Plain-English Definition
We favor people who are similar to us or who like us.
Feynman Explanation
Hire for 'culture fit' and accidentally hire for 'looks like me'.
Core Principle
We favor people who are similar to us or who like us.
Mechanisms
Pending editorial review.
We favor people who are similar to us or who like us.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Affinity silently shapes who gets funded, hired, and promoted.
Inputs (Triggers)
Pending editorial review.
Outputs (Behaviors)
Pending editorial review.
Behavioral Signature
Hire for 'culture fit' and accidentally hire for 'looks like me'.
Examples
- A hiring manager prefers the candidate who shares their alma mater.
- Affinity silently shapes who gets funded, hired, and promoted.
Pending editorial review.
Famous Experiments
Pending editorial review.
Design Principles
- Blind relevant traits and use structured scorecards.
Measurement Approaches
Pending editorial review.
Evidence
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
The Perverse Incentive Lens™
How this behavior is exploited — and how to redesign around it.
- Blind relevant traits and use structured scorecards.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Interactive Mini Network
Click any neighbor to re-center the graph and follow the threads of connection.
Knowledge Graph Neighbors
Auto-linked to the rest of the Human Behavior Taxonomy by family, domain, dimension, and shared keywords.
We attribute our own actions to situations but others' actions to their character.
Systematic errors in explaining the causes of behavior — yours or others'.
Faces and brands look more appealing in a group than individually.
Avoiding contact with people or things perceived as 'contaminated'.
Giving polite rather than honest answers to avoid offense.
Judging phenomena by the standards of one's own culture.
A group decides on a course of action that nobody actually wants, because everyone assumes others prefer it.
Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Sacrificing for others without expecting a personal reward.
Masking the sponsors of a message to make it appear grassroots.
Disagreement grows more extreme as the parties think more about the issue.
We accept vague, general statements as personally meaningful.