Perspective-Taking Exercises That Check Your Guesses
The strongest evidence on perspective taking says that imagining another person’s viewpoint, on its own, rarely makes you more accurate about what they think, while getting their perspective by asking does. So the most useful exercises use imagination to generate possibilities and then check them with the person. Below are five exercises built that way, from a two-minute prediction test to a calmer way to review an argument.
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The finding that should change how you practice
“Put yourself in their shoes” is the standard advice. Eyal, Steffel, and Epley tested it in 25 experiments, asking people to judge others’ emotions from faces and postures, tell fake smiles from real ones, detect lies, and predict a spouse’s activity preferences and opinions. Most people in pretests expected that taking the other person’s perspective would help. It did not consistently improve accuracy; if anything, it lowered accuracy overall while sometimes raising confidence. In a final experiment, partners who got each other’s perspective directly, through conversation, became more accurate. (Eyal, Steffel, and Epley, 2018)
The authors’ conclusion is blunt: understanding another mind seems to require new information, not just reworking what you already know. That is why every exercise below ends with a check.
Why imagining falls short
Earlier work by Nicholas Epley and colleagues suggests how perspective taking goes wrong. People estimate what others perceive by starting from their own view and adjusting away from it. The adjustment tends to stop as soon as an answer seems plausible, it shrinks under time pressure, and it improves when people are rewarded for accuracy. (Epley and colleagues, 2004) So your imagined version of your coworker is often you, slightly edited.
| Perspective taking | Perspective getting | |
|---|---|---|
| What you do | Imagine how things look from their side | Ask them and listen to the answer |
| Information used | What you already know or assume | New information from the person |
| Main risk | Confident, plausible, wrong story | They may not want to share, or may not know |
| Best use | Generating questions and possibilities | Settling what they actually think or want |
Exercise 1: Predict, then ask (two minutes)
Pick someone you know well. Write down your predictions for five small preferences: where they would choose to eat on Friday, which of two movies they would pick, whether they would rather have a quiet weekend or a busy one, which chore they dislike most, and what they would do with a free afternoon. Then ask them. Score yourself.
Most people miss at least one, and the misses are informative. Did you assume they share your taste? Did you go with what they liked five years ago? This is the quickest way to feel the gap between knowing someone and knowing what they think today.
Exercise 2: Three readings of one message
Take an ambiguous message you received, for example a friend’s text: “sure, whatever works.” Write three different interpretations: they are relaxed and flexible; they are annoyed and giving up; they are busy and replying quickly. For each, write what else you would expect to see if it were true.
Then write one question that would tell them apart without accusing anyone: “Happy to pick, but do you have a preference? I don’t want to steamroll you.” The question is the point of the exercise.
Exercise 3: Slow down the first guess
Because egocentric bias grows under time pressure, a little delay helps. The next time you feel certain about why someone did something (“He left me off that email on purpose”), write the guess down and give yourself until the end of the day before acting. During that time, list one fact that supports your guess and one that does not.
If you still need to know, ask in a way that leaves room: “I noticed I wasn’t on the email about the launch. Was that intentional, or should I be looped in?”
Exercise 4: The fair witness review
After a disagreement, write a short account of it from the point of view of a neutral person who wants the best for both of you. What would that person see that you missed? What would they say each of you was trying to protect?
This is adapted from a reappraisal exercise studied by Eli Finkel and colleagues. In a two-year study of 120 married couples, those randomly assigned to spend about 21 minutes in the second year writing about their conflicts from the viewpoint of a neutral third party who wants the best for everyone avoided the decline in marital quality that the comparison couples showed that year. (Finkel and colleagues, 2013) That study tested a writing task about conflict, not mind reading, so use the fair witness view to cool down and generate questions, then check them with the other person.
Exercise 5: Steelman, then check
Before you argue against someone’s position, write the strongest, fairest version of it in two or three sentences, the version they would sign. Then read it to them: “Let me make sure I have your view right before I respond. You think we should hire now because the backlog is costing us customers, and waiting until January means another quarter of that. Is that it?”
If they correct you, revise until they agree, then give your view. People who feel accurately represented argue less about whether they were heard and more about the actual problem.
The mistakes that turn questions into accusations
- Questions with a verdict inside: “Why are you always so defensive?” assumes the answer. Try “What was going on for you when I brought that up?”
- Too many questions at once. Ask one, then wait.
- Asking when the person has said they do not want to talk. Respect that, and offer a later time instead.
- Treating their answer as a negotiation. If they say they were not upset, you can believe them, even if you would have been.
Run all five over one week
- Day 1: Predict, then ask, with one person at home or among friends.
- Day 2 or 3: Three readings of one message from your inbox or texts.
- Day 4: Slow down one certain guess about someone’s motive.
- Day 5: Fair witness review of any recent disagreement, even a minor one.
- Day 6 or 7: Steelman, then check, in one real conversation.
- At the end, write which exercise surprised you most and which guess turned out wrong.
Perspective getting depends on hearing the answer well, which is the subject of empathic listening. For checking nonverbal cues, see reading social cues. All guides are collected in the empathy hub.
Use the free EQTiger assessment to choose a starting point for reflection. Read what the assessment includes and the limitations before interpreting your result.
Research notes
Eyal, Steffel, and Epley, 2018: Across 25 experiments, being told to imagine another person’s perspective did not consistently improve accuracy about their feelings or preferences (if anything it lowered accuracy while raising confidence), whereas asking the person directly did improve accuracy.
Tal Eyal, Mary Steffel, Nicholas Epley (2018). Perspective mistaking: Accurately understanding the mind of another requires getting perspective, not taking perspective. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 114(4), 547-571. doi.org/10.1037/pspa0000115
Epley and colleagues, 2004: Five studies found that people judge others’ perceptions by starting from their own and adjusting, that this egocentric bias grew under time pressure and shrank with accuracy incentives, and that adjustment tends to stop once a plausible answer is reached.
Nicholas Epley, Boaz Keysar, Leaf Van Boven, Thomas Gilovich (2004). Perspective taking as egocentric anchoring and adjustment. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 87(3), 327-339. doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.87.3.327
Finkel and colleagues, 2013: Among 120 married couples, those randomly assigned to three 7-minute writing tasks (21 minutes in a year) about viewing their conflicts as a neutral third party who wants the best for both avoided the year-two decline in marital quality that control couples showed.
Eli J. Finkel, Erica B. Slotter, Laura B. Luchies, Gregory M. Walton, James J. Gross (2013). A Brief Intervention to Promote Conflict Reappraisal Preserves Marital Quality Over Time. Psychological Science. doi.org/10.1177/0956797612474938
2 questions
Questions
Is perspective taking useless, then?
No. Considering another viewpoint can reduce the habit of assuming everyone sees things as you do, and it helps you think of better questions. It just should not replace asking when asking is possible.
What if I can’t ask the person?
Then hold your interpretation loosely, look for information you can actually verify (what they said, what they did), and avoid acting on a single guess when the stakes are high.
Related
- No. 01Cognitive vs. Emotional Empathy: What Differs?Cognitive empathy is understanding what another person is thinking and feeling; emotional empathy is feeling some of that emotion yourself. They are separate capacities, so a person can be strong in one and modest in the other, and neither guarantees a kind response. Compassion, warm concern plus a wish to help, is a third response that researchers distinguish from both.
- No. 02Reading Social Cues Without Assuming You KnowA social cue, such as a frown, a short reply, or a pause, tells you that something may be going on, not what it is. Research on facial expressions finds that the same face can signal different emotions, or no emotion, depending on the person and situation, and people overestimate how clearly their tone comes through in writing. Read cues alongside context and what you know about that person, then ask a light question when the answer matters.
- No. 03Empathic Listening: Hear the Point Before HelpingEmpathic listening means attending closely enough to understand what matters to the speaker, showing that understanding in your own words, and only then choosing how to respond. In one controlled experiment, people who got paraphrasing and questions felt more understood than people who got advice or a simple acknowledgment. It does not mean never giving advice; it means advice comes after you know what the problem is.
- No. 04Listening During Conflict Without Losing Your VoiceListening during conflict means understanding the other person’s concern well enough to summarize it to their satisfaction before you argue your side. It does not mean agreeing, going quiet, or softening a problem that needs to change. Lab research suggests that being listened to well makes people less defensive and less extreme, and research on couples suggests calming down during conflict supports more constructive communication.
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