One idea is to “call out” the pressure you feel. “I’m having trouble saying anything because I’m worried what you will think of me.” This isn’t always a good idea, but it can often work fairly well. Someone who is caving to incentives isn’t very likely to say something like that, so it provides some evidence that you’re being genuine.
If it provides evidence that I’m being genuine, someone who isn’t being genuine would use this strategy and say the same thing. The other person knows this, so “calling out” shouldn’t provide evidence that I’m being genuine. If a person who isn’t being genuine wouldn’t use this strategy in the first place because it has a net effect of undermining their credibility, then I also shouldn’t be using this strategy since it has a net effect of undermining my credibility.
In practice this isn’t always correct (maybe people who are being genuine are a bit more likely to worry about incentives) but this consideration has a similar shutting down effect on me because we are just pushing the incentive problem to a different layer.
Fair. I think the analysis I was giving could be steel-manned as: pretenders are only boundedly sophisticated; they can’t model the genuine mindset perfectly. So, saying what is actually on your mind (eg calling out the incentive issues which are making honesty difficult) can be a good strategy.
However, the “call out” strategy is not one I recall using very often; I think I wrote about it because other people have mentioned it, not because I’ve had sucess with it myself.
Thinking about it now, my main concerns are: 1. If the other person is being genuine, and I “call out” the perverse incentives that theoretically make genuine dialogue difficult in this circumstance, then the other person might stop being genuine due to perceiving me as not trusting them.
2. If the other person is not being genuine, then the “call out” strategy can backfire. For example, let’s say some travel plans are dependent on me (maybe I am the friend who owns a car) and someone is trying to confirm that I am happy to do this. Instead of just confirming, which is what they want, I “call out” that I feel like I’d be disappointing everyone if I said no. If they’re not genuinely concerned for my enthusiasm and instead disingenuously wanted me to make enthusiastic noises so that others didn’t feel I was being taken advantage of, then they could manipulatively take advantage of my revealed fear of letting the group down, somehow.
If it provides evidence that I’m being genuine, someone who isn’t being genuine would use this strategy and say the same thing. The other person knows this, so “calling out” shouldn’t provide evidence that I’m being genuine. If a person who isn’t being genuine wouldn’t use this strategy in the first place because it has a net effect of undermining their credibility, then I also shouldn’t be using this strategy since it has a net effect of undermining my credibility.
In practice this isn’t always correct (maybe people who are being genuine are a bit more likely to worry about incentives) but this consideration has a similar shutting down effect on me because we are just pushing the incentive problem to a different layer.
Fair. I think the analysis I was giving could be steel-manned as: pretenders are only boundedly sophisticated; they can’t model the genuine mindset perfectly. So, saying what is actually on your mind (eg calling out the incentive issues which are making honesty difficult) can be a good strategy.
However, the “call out” strategy is not one I recall using very often; I think I wrote about it because other people have mentioned it, not because I’ve had sucess with it myself.
Thinking about it now, my main concerns are:
1. If the other person is being genuine, and I “call out” the perverse incentives that theoretically make genuine dialogue difficult in this circumstance, then the other person might stop being genuine due to perceiving me as not trusting them.
2. If the other person is not being genuine, then the “call out” strategy can backfire. For example, let’s say some travel plans are dependent on me (maybe I am the friend who owns a car) and someone is trying to confirm that I am happy to do this. Instead of just confirming, which is what they want, I “call out” that I feel like I’d be disappointing everyone if I said no. If they’re not genuinely concerned for my enthusiasm and instead disingenuously wanted me to make enthusiastic noises so that others didn’t feel I was being taken advantage of, then they could manipulatively take advantage of my revealed fear of letting the group down, somehow.