Sleight of Mouth is robert Dilts's 14 conversational reframing patterns for shifting limiting beliefs in real time. It sits in the Cognition dimension (COG) of the Human Behavior Taxonomy™ as element HBT-COG-0621, within the Social family. The core principle: robert Dilts's 14 conversational reframing patterns for shifting limiting beliefs in real time. In incentive terms, it matters because it changes the payoff people perceive before they choose — which means it can be designed for, or exploited.
Scientific Definition
Robert Dilts's 14 conversational reframing patterns for shifting limiting beliefs in real time.
Plain-English Definition
Robert Dilts's 14 conversational reframing patterns for shifting limiting beliefs in real time.
Feynman Explanation
A belief is just a sentence you haven't reframed yet.
Core Principle
Robert Dilts's 14 conversational reframing patterns for shifting limiting beliefs in real time.
Mechanisms
Pending editorial review.
Robert Dilts's 14 conversational reframing patterns for shifting limiting beliefs in real time.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Sales objection handling, negotiation, leadership coaching.
Inputs (Triggers)
Pending editorial review.
Outputs (Behaviors)
Pending editorial review.
Behavioral Signature
A belief is just a sentence you haven't reframed yet.
Examples
- Patterns include redefining, consequence, counter-example, hierarchy of criteria, model of the world.
- Sales objection handling, negotiation, leadership coaching.
Pending editorial review.
Original analysis from The Incentives Lab — how this element behaves inside real payoff structures.
Why this element matters to incentive design
The mistake with this element is treating it as irrationality. It is almost always a rational response to a payoff nobody wrote down. The mechanism underneath it is straightforward: robert Dilts's 14 conversational reframing patterns for shifting limiting beliefs in real time. You can recognize it in the field by its signature: a belief is just a sentence you haven't reframed yet. Every element in the Cognition dimension changes the perceived payoff of an action before the action happens, which is exactly where incentive design has leverage.
How it gets exploited
Left undesigned, sales objection handling, negotiation, leadership coaching. It is amplified whenever sales objection handling, negotiation, leadership coaching. Inside organizations that shows up as sales objection handling, negotiation, leadership coaching. The pattern is the same one Goodhart's Law describes: the measurable proxy attracts the effort, and the purpose behind it quietly loses funding.
How the Lab designs around it
The redesign move is to use to open thinking, not to bulldoze it. Manipulation is detectable and costly long-term. The test of any redesign here is simple: after the change, can you name what the organization is now doing less of? If not, the payoff structure did not actually move.
Famous Experiments
Pending editorial review.
Design Principles
- Use to open thinking, not to bulldoze it. Manipulation is detectable and costly long-term.
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.
- Use to open thinking, not to bulldoze it. Manipulation is detectable and costly long-term.
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.
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.
We attribute our own actions to situations but others' actions to their character.
We favor people who are similar to us or who like us.
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.
Systematic errors in explaining the causes of behavior — yours or others'.
We accept vague, general statements as personally meaningful.
Adding the word 'because' (with any reason) increases compliance dramatically.
Behaviors spread through groups via observation and imitation.
We come to like people we've done a favor for, more than people who've helped us.
Where Sleight of Mouth is cited in the corpus
Essays, field guides, and diagnostics from The Incentives Lab that apply this element.
- EssayGoodhart's Law in the Real World
How measurable proxies capture judgment.
- EssayThe Perverse Incentives Hiding in Your KPIs
Cognitive shortcuts turned into scorecards.
- EssayAI Agents Inherit Your Incentives
How this element propagates into automated systems.
- ReferenceThe Periodic Table of Human Behavior
The full 1,267-element map this page belongs to.
- ReferenceThe incentive glossary
Definitions for every mental model, bias, and fallacy in the corpus.
Questions about Sleight of Mouth
- What is Sleight of Mouth?
- Sleight of Mouth is robert Dilts's 14 conversational reframing patterns for shifting limiting beliefs in real time. It sits in the Cognition dimension (COG) of the Human Behavior Taxonomy™ as element HBT-COG-0621, within the Social family. The core principle: robert Dilts's 14 conversational reframing patterns for shifting limiting beliefs in real time. In incentive terms, it matters because it changes the payoff people perceive before they choose — which means it can be designed for, or exploited.
- What is an example of Sleight of Mouth?
- Sales objection handling, negotiation, leadership coaching. The Incentives Lab catalogs everyday, organizational, and historical instances of this element on its Human Behavior Taxonomy™ page (HBT-COG-0621).
- How is Sleight of Mouth exploited?
- Sales objection handling, negotiation, leadership coaching.
- How do you design around Sleight of Mouth?
- Use to open thinking, not to bulldoze it. Manipulation is detectable and costly long-term.
- Which behavioral dimension does Sleight of Mouth belong to?
- Sleight of Mouth is classified in the Cognition dimension (COG) of the Human Behavior Taxonomy™, family "Social", class "Mental Model". Its permanent identifier is HBT-COG-0621 and its evidence grade is B.