Mirroring Technique In Psychology: Pacing And Leading To Influence Others

The mirroring technique in psychology, also called pacing and leading, is an easy way to connect with people around you. You do it simply by imitating the person you are persuading. Chances are you’ve never been taught it. But the best persuaders use it to increase their influence in the workplace and you should too.

Mirroring Technique In Psychology

Mirroring someone provides such a pre-suasive avenue and is a concept from neuro-linguistic programming. The technique involves first pacing or matching the person you are trying to lead, mimicking their posture, speech, gestures, and most importantly, emotion. If paced correctly, you will establish rapport and trust with them. In this connected state, you will appear more persuasive to them. They will view you as their leader.

The next time you meet with sales reps you might notice them mirroring you. Even with your awareness of this technique it will still work on you. Now this is precisely what separates true persuasion techniques from the rest that don’t work.

In several studies, people’s verbal and nonverbal behavior (gestures, posture) were mimicked and mirrored. It resulted in waitresses doubling their tips (1), negotiators obtaining better outcomes (2), and electronics store salespeople getting greater compliance from customers and selling more products to them (3).

How To Use The Mirroring Technique In Psychology (Pacing And Leading)

Follow these simple steps to mirror people you are trying to influence. Once you have connected with them, they will be more likely to take cues from you. You first pace them and then lead them to where you want them to go in a decision.

This is a powerful psychological technique in which your mirroring subconsciously wins your subject over. You must use it only in an ethical manner.

1. Mirroring Their Breathing Pattern

When you start mirroring someone, it must be done subtly. They should not be aware that you are consciously mimicking them. The best way to initiate a mirroring technique is to synchronize your breathing pace with theirs.

For practice, match the breathing rate and depth of someone near you at a meeting. Look away and then check back to see if you are still timed. Soon you will get good at this.

2. Mirror Their Posture And Gestures

Advance the mirroring technique to their body language and hand movements now.

If they have their arms folded and are leaning forward, you should too. If they change position, you should continue matching some of this. Give yourself about a three second lag before you mimic an action to not make it obvious.

3. Match Their Speech And Emotions

Use the same tone, volume, and verbal style. Use similar words and phrases, even repeating some back. Gauge their emotional state and mimic it through your actions and words. Your mimicking should be strategic, don’t copy every action.

4. Check For Pacing

You should now check to see if you have used the mirroring technique correctly to psychologically connect with them. So after some amount of mirroring/pacing, make a change of your own like uncrossing your arms or leaning back.

If you have paced them correctly, they will follow your shift and now be mirroring you.

5. Complete The Mirroring Technique And Move To Leading

You can now change your emotions to get them to align with you and initiate leading with the greatest chance of compliance.

6. Bonus Move When Pacing And Leading Someone

Just prior to your request, provide a genuine compliment. This acts as a force multiplier and brings about even greater willingness to follow.

How The Mirroring Technique Helps You Psychologically Connect With Someone

The mechanism, from a behavioral sciences perspective, is that when you mimic and mirror someone, a strong sense of similarity and unity with you is created in their mind. Humans evolved to experience feelings of liking (4), interpersonal trust (5), and social bonding (6) with people who are synchronized with them (dancing, singing, marching).

Cognitive scientists believe that these effects arise due to a blurring of the perception of ‘self’ and ‘other’ leading to this strong affiliation (7, 8). Neurohormonal mechanisms also play a role during synchronization with the release of endogenous opioids that encourage social attachment (8).

This likeness leads to them liking and trusting you (8). The compliment lets them know that you like them (dopamine boost). In this privileged state, they are cognitively primed to perfection (pre-suaded). Now the facts you provide are used to justify a decision they have already made, to be led by you.  Like Renee Zellweger’s character in Jerry Maguire — “You had me at hello.”

Simply trying to be persuasive with someone at work through reasoning and facts alone will only make them argue and resist, leading to low compliance. You must use the persuasion technique of pacing them first.

Why Reasoning Is Rarely Persuasive

The mistake people make when they influence others is that they directly try persuading them with reasoning and facts. However, new discoveries in cognitive sciences show that people are not persuaded by rational reasoning but by irrational tendencies derived mostly from their emotional state.

The leading theory, called the argumentative theory, proposes that reasoning evolved in early humans more for the sake of winning arguments than as a guide to effective decision making (7). You should never try to be persuasive with others at work by directly reasoning with them.

Most behavioral scientists now agree that trying to bring people to your side only with facts usually fails. The effective way to be persuasive at work is to move people to a more receptive emotional state prior to influencing them–a pre-suasive state or sweet spot that triggers the primitive and more active decision-making processes (8).

Examples Where You Could Use The Mirroring Technique At Work

A great opportunity for mirroring is when your employees are emotionally vulnerable (fear, insecurity, frustration). The conventional leader will think that being calm will help mitigate things. Surprisingly, this actually leads to more stress as they realize their leader is out of touch with them. Instead, match their stress level and posture. Speak about the fears they have using their words.

Get synchronized with them with the mirroring technique. Then work them to a better state of mind with your plan and vision going from despair to resoluteness and hope. This is the real way to be persuasive at work.

At job interviews, pace the interviewer’s breathing, use some of the same phrases they use, and match their posture and emotions. Compliment them. Then lead them to your candidacy. They will be inexplicably drawn to you and want you on their team.

This is weapons-grade persuasion. You can even use this on your own management. Try it with your children or spouse (if you dare). You will be surprised at the many “yes” responses you get. Enjoy this superpower but only use it to be persuasive at work in positive situations. Never to manipulate others.

Additional Reading

For an interesting take on how President Trump used pacing and leading to rally his base in the 2016 elections, read Win Bigly: Persuasion in a World Where Facts Don’t Matter, a New York Times bestselling book by Scott Adams, Dilbert creator and persuasion expert.  This book has many other useful persuasion tips as well.

Here you will find our recommended list of books that cover additional ways for you to influence better in the workplace.

Mirroring Psychology

Mirroring in psychology is defined as the unconscious copying of another person’s posture, gestures or speech. In everyday situations when people interact with each other, mirroring is common and usually unnoticed. It is a powerful way for humans to connect with each other and build empathy. Mirroring in humans starts as early as infancy.

Mirroring Techniques Used In Ancient Times

For the religiously minded, here are some examples from 2000 years ago.  St. Paul in 1 COR 9: 21-22 says, “To those not having the law I became like one not having the law……, so as to win those not having the law.  To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some.”  And didn’t God pace us by coming to us in the form of man?  The best way to lead humans to salvation is by coming as one of us, like Christ did.  The most glorious pacing and leading ever!

References

1. Van Baaren, R. B.; Holland, R. W.; Steenaert, B.; van Knippenberg, A. “Mimicry for Money: Behavioral Consequences of Imitation” Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 2003, 39, 393-398.
2. Maddux, W. W.; Mullen, E. E.; Galinsky, A. D. “Chameleons Bake Bigger Pies and Take Bigger Pieces: Strategic Behavioral Mimicry Facilitates Negotiation Outcomes” Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 2008, 44, 461-468.
3. Jacob, C.; Guéguen, N.; Martin, A.; Boulbry, G. “Retail Salespeople’s Mimicry of Customers: Effects on Consumer Behavior” Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 2011, 18, 381-388.
4. Hove, M.J.; Risen, J.L. “It’s all in the Timing: Interpersonal Synchrony Increases Affiliation” Social Cognition, 2009, 27, 949–961.
5. Launay, J.; Dean, R.T.; Bailes, F. “Synchronization can Influence Trust Following Virtual Interaction” Experimental Psychology, 2013, 60, 53–63.
6. Tarr, B.; Launay, J.; Cohen, E.; Dunbar, R. “Synchrony and Exertion During Dance Independently Raise Pain Threshold and Encourage Social Bonding” Biology Letters, 2015, 11, 0767.
7. Decety, J.; Sommerville, J.A. “Shared Representations Between Self and Other: A Social Cognitive Neuroscience View” Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 2003, 7, 527–533.
8. Tarr, B.; Launay, J.; Dunbar, R.I.M. “Music and Social Bonding: ‘Self–Other’ Merging and Neurohormonal Mechanisms” Frontiers in Psychology: Auditory Cognitive Neuroscience, 2014, 5, 1-10.
9. Mercier, H.; Sperber, D. “Why do Humans Reason? Arguments for an Argumentative Theory” Behavioral and Brian Sciences, 2011, 34, 57-111.
10. Cialdini, R. “Pre-Suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade” Simon & Schuster, New York, NY 2016.

Keywords

Mirroring Techniques Psychology; Influence; Persuasion; Pacing And Leading; Mirroring and Matching

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