Shared Reality: From Sharing-Is-Believing to Merging Minds

• Published in: Current directions in psychological science : a journal of the American Psychological Society Vol. 30; no. 2; pp. 103 - 110
• Main Authors: Higgins, E. Tory, Rossignac-Milon, Maya, Echterhoff, Gerald
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Los Angeles, CA SAGE Publications 01-04-2021; SAGE PUBLICATIONS, INC
• Subjects: shared reality; interpersonal relationships; communication; epistemic motivation
• ISSN: 0963-7214; 1467-8721
• DOI: 10.1177/0963721421992027

Humans are fundamentally motivated to create a sense of shared reality—the perceived commonality of inner states (feeling, beliefs, and concerns about the world) with other people. This shared reality establishes a sense of both social connection and understanding the world. Research on shared reality has burgeoned in recent decades. We first review evidence for a basic building block of shared-reality creation: sharing-is-believing, whereby communicators tune their descriptions to align with their communication partner’s attitude about something, which in turn shapes their recall. Next, we describe recent developments moving beyond this basic building block to explore generalized shared reality about the world at large, which promotes interpersonal closeness and epistemic certainty. Together, this body of work exemplifies the synergy between relational and epistemic motives. Finally, we discuss the potential for another form of shared reality—shared relevance—to bridge disparate realities.