Did everyone see me do that?

We often feel that everything we do is under a social microscope. For example, we worry that everyone will notice the awkward statement that we make during an important conference call or that everyone was focused on our appearance on a "bad hair day." Are such worries justified or are we just being too sensitive when such thoughts cross our mind?

Fear of the social spotlight: Overly sensitive or appropriately vigilant?

According to research findings, we are often too sensitive about how closely others are watching our every move. Social psychologists have studied this phenomenon, which they refer to as "the spotlight effect." Interestingly, the research suggests that we greatly overexaggerate the extent to which the world is watching us.

A set of experiments conducted by Cornell University Professor Tom Gilovich and his colleagues illustrate the spotlight effect well. In some of their studies, Cornell undergraduates were asked to wear a Barry Manilow t-shirt. Although some readers may gleefully begin singing "Mandy" or "Copacabana" at this point, most undergraduates at Cornell would find wearing a t-shirt with Manilow's schnoz in front of other students to be embarrassing. At the end of the study, the shirt wearer was asked to estimate what percentage of the other students would remember their shirt, and they expected that nearly half of the students in the room would be able to recall their embarrassing shirt. However, in actuality when the others students were asked to identify the shirt, less than a quarter of them could do it. On average, people expected that twice as many people would recall the shirt as they actually did.

However, the spotlight is not just reserved for embarrassing moments -- it works just as well for positive events too. When asked to wear a shirt that most Cornell students saw as very positive (e.g., one featuring Martin Luther King, Jr.), shirt wears still overestimated the percentage of students who would remember it (estimates were about 45%) than actually did (less than 10%).

Although people may be overly sensitive to who's noticing what they wear, research suggests that the spotlight effect occurs for more substantial events. In one study were students held group discussions, people felt their own comments, ranging from speech flubs to remarkable contributions to the conversations, were far more memorable than they actually were.

Why does it occur?

What fuels people's feeling that they are always in the spotlight? It seems to occur because of an overarching egocentrism to which most people are susceptible. Instead of being a greedy, selfish form of egocentrism, this particular manifestation involves being extremely aware of ourselves (e.g., our appearance, our utterances) and not being able to take the perspective of others who do not spend every waking moment of the day focusing on our thoughts, utterances, and actions.

Of course, none of this suggests that our screw-ups will always be hidden from others or that our great contributions on a conference call won't earn us a big promotion. However, the research suggests that people should take some comfort that our verbal gaffs, occasional clumsiness, and bad hair is often only bathed in the spotlight of our own mind.