EXAMINING THE IMPACT OF CONTROL CONDITION DESIGN IN MIMICRY–LIKING LINK RESEARCH: HOW MOTOR BEHAVIOR MAY IMPACT LIKING*
EXAMINING THE IMPACT OF CONTROL CONDITION DESIGN IN MIMICRY–LIKING LINK RESEARCH: HOW MOTOR BEHAVIOR MAY IMPACT LIKING*

Summary/Abstract: Mimicry is an automatic imitation of an interacting partner’s behaviors. The most frequently re-searched consequence of being mimicked is liking. Yet there is little research on whether specificdesign of control conditions (i.e., variable behavior of the confederate across conditions) may affectstudy results. In this study, we compared the classical mimicry group with four control conditions:(i–ii) a confederate sits still or makes random movements (common in mimicry research), (iii)confederates receive no instructions regarding their nonverbal behavior (rarely observed in mim-icry studies), and a condition that we created, in which (iv) a confederate makes atypical motormovements. Participants (N = 538) were interviewed by confederates, while the confederates’ be-havior varied across conditions during the interviews. They mimicked the participants’ nonverbalbehaviors (mimicry condition), sat still (no-movement condition), made random nonverbal move-ments unrelated to the participants (responsiveness condition), made repetitive body and objectmovements (repetitive behavior condition), or participated in the interview without any furtherinstructions (double-blind condition). The confederate’s behavior influenced liking: χ2(4) = 40.7,p < 0.001, ε2 = 0.07. Participants liked the confederates more when the latter mimicked them thanwhen they sat still (p < 0.001) or made repetitive movements (p = 0.008), but not when the confed-erates made random movements, and when they only engaged in the conversation (p > 0.5). There were also differences between the no-movements condition (i) and the responsiveness condition(p = 0.003), (ii) and the double-blind condition (p < 0.001). Because the two classical control con-ditions are treated interchangeably in mimicry studies, more attention should be paid to the meth-odological aspects of mimicry research. Additionally, a mini-metaanalysis was conducted.

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