Psychologist John R. Schafer, Ph.D., writes in a recent post in Psychology Today that he knows how you can get other people to like you (and he’s not talking about Facebook) if they don’t already. It’s all in making others feel good about themselves.
Schafer says there are two main ways to get other people to like you, starting from when you first meet them. Broadly categorized he says there are some basic physical movements you can make that will indicate that you are someone safe to be liked. The second way is by speaking in a ways that show you have empathy.
The body movements are: eyebrow flashing, head tilting and smiling. The eyebrow flash is that little thing people do when they raise their eyebrows slightly, then lower them. Schafer says it’s a mechanism people have developed over millions of years to let others know as they approach that they are trustworthy and thus there is no need to be afraid. Thus, flashing your eyebrows when approaching someone new alerts them, albeit somewhat manipulatively if done on purpose, that you are someone they can feel safe and secure being around. As for head tilting, Schafer likens it to a dog laying down and exposing his belly; with people, it’s exposing the carotid artery by tilting the head, it indicates you trust the people you are with, thus giving them reason to feel at ease in your presence. As for smiling, if it’s genuine, it always means you are sending a signal that you like whoever you are looking at. Also, smiling sort of nudges others to smile back, which then works in reverse. If a person finds him or self smiling at someone, they must like them, right?
The second thing you can do is to speak with empathetic statements, for example, if someone tells you that they have been working hard all week, you could reply with a statement such as, huh, that probably means you didn’t have much free time to do other stuff. Such a statement, Schafer says, lets the person know first of all, that you were listening to not just the words spoken to you, but to what the other person was trying to convey, namely that they were bummed at having to work so much instead of being out and about having a good time. By noticing that and then responding in a way that lets them know you both understand and care about their situation, you are letting them know you are an empathetic person. And doing that, he says, makes people like you. That and using flattery.