Amie Gordon


I USE a social psychological lens to examine the invisible forces
THAT SHAPE SOCIAL INTERACTIONS.





Every day we interact with a variety of people, from close others at home to coworkers at the office to strangers at the grocery store, in an attempt to achieve our goals. Whether those goals are solving a problem, making a joint decision, expressing discontent, or building a social connection, successfully navigating social interactions is not always easy—there are many forces, seen and unseen, influencing the interaction.


This is where my research comes in. I explore:


1) How we understand other people’s minds and how we feel understood and valued by others.

2) The biological and contextual factors that influence social interactions—from basic biological processes like sleep and hunger to social constructs like power and motivation.


In doing so, I look past the individual to capture how people mutually influence each other as they interact.



Feeling understood and valued





Feeling that an interaction partner really “gets you” is a neurologically rewarding experience that leads to many positive outcomes including greater psychological connection, liking, coordination, and willingness to compromise. On the flipside, feeling misunderstood or undervalued bodes poorly for social interactions at the individual, group, and organizational levels. I examine whether perceptions of understanding and value lay the foundation for successful, satisfying social interactions and ultimately high quality relationships. For example, I've found that feeling understood buffers against the negative effects of conflict and that feeling valued promotes gratitude and responsive behaviors.





BIOLOGICAL AND CONTEXTUAL factors that shape social interactions





In every social interaction a multitude of forces are at work altering the trajectory of the interaction. Some of these factors are readily apparent (e.g., our relationship to the other person), but many biological and contextual factors are less apparent—our sense of power relative to the person we are interacting with, how tired or hungry we are, our motivational focus. These less apparent factors affect how people respond to each other in the moment and influence the quality of social relationships over time—without people ever being fully aware of their effects. In my work, I aim to identify these forces and find strategies to combat those that hinder the success of social interactions and harm social relationships.​



IT TAKES TWO TO TANGO.





One unifying theme throughout my research is my focus on fully capturing the richness of social interactions by taking a dyadic approach and examining the ways in which partners knowingly and unknowingly influence each other as they interact. I do this by going beyond people’s own experiences during interactions to capture how people are affected by their partner’s actual thoughts, feelings, behaviors and physiological responses as well as by their perceptions and expectations of their partner. For example, I've found that people are less empathically accurate during conflict if either they or their partner slept poorly the prior night and that poor sleep may lead people to overestimate their partner's negativity.

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I also believe it is important to look at distinctively dyadic outcomes—how interactions are shaped not by each individual alone but by the unique way that they interact with each other. From this perspective, I've found that conflict is most likely to be resolved when both interaction partners slept well the night before.​






AMIE M. GORDON, PHD



UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO