Undervaluing the advantages of displaying skills in front of an expert

Job candidates and competitors aim to earn admission or high ratings. People tend to avoid displaying their skills in front of an expert due to the prediction that they will be rated unfavorably because the expert can accurately evaluate their level of skill. However, is this prediction accurate? The present research proposes a misprediction: candidates will undervalue the advantages of showing skills in front of an expert. This is because evaluators partially base their evaluations on the pride elicited by alluding to their expertise, whereas candidates base their predictions on whether their competence will be accurately evaluated but neglect evaluators’ pride. Eight studies (N = 1, 888) demonstrated the proposed misprediction and tested its underlying mechanism. In Study 1, we assigned the participants to the candidate or the evaluator condition. The candidates made an incentive-compatible prediction on how they would be more likely to be admitted by displaying their skills in front of an expert or a non-expert. The evaluators admitted one between a candidate displaying skills in the evaluators’ area of expertise and a candidate displaying skills outside the evaluators’ area of expertise. The results showed that the evaluators preferred the candidate who showcased skills in the evaluators’ area of expertise. However, the candidates avoided doing so, which reduced their chances of admission. Studies 2 and 3 replicated the results in Study 1 with different competition forms (promotion or elimination) and in the case where candidates were assigned to display skills in or outside the evaluators’ area of expertise. These studies ruled out two alternative explanations that the evaluators preferred the candidate who showcased skills in the evaluators’ area of expertise solely because they were similar to the candidate or could easily evaluate the candidate. Studies 4 and 5 manipulated the candidates’ motivation to win the competition and their level of competence, respectively, to test whether they avoided displaying skills in front of experts due to the concern that their competence could be evaluated accurately by experts. The results indicated that the candidates showed a stronger misprediction and were less likely to showcase skills in front of experts when they highly (vs. less) desired to win the competition or had a lower (vs. moderate and higher) competence. Study 6 prompted the candidates to empathize with evaluators. We asked the candidates to think about their feelings when others made references to their expertise. As a result, the candidates were aware of their pride and made a more accurate prediction. Study 7 manipulated the evaluators’ pride to test whether they preferred the candidate who displayed skills in the evaluators’ area of expertise because that they felt pride when their expertise was referred to. The results revealed that the evaluators with lower (vs. higher) pride were less likely to admit the candidates who displayed skills in the evaluators’ area of expertise. In Study 8, we recorded the participants’ real-time thoughts during their decision making. The results again showed that the candidates focused on their competence during their decision-making process, whereas the evaluators’ preferences were affected by their pride. In addition, the real-time thoughts led to the underestimation about the benefits of displaying skills in front of an expert. We reveal that people fail to accurately predict the effect of a self-presentation strategy. Candidates undervalue the strategy of displaying skills in front of experts due to the empathy gap that they neglect the pride experienced by experts. Consequently, candidates mistakenly avoid displaying skills in front of experts and thus miss the chance to earn admission. Besides, we offer a feasible approach to reduce such a bias. Our findings encourage candidates to empathize with evaluators and strategically perform to experts.