How do people make sense of the world and determine what is real? We propose that conversation enhances the perceived realness of everyday objects and experiences by allowing conversation partners to develop a shared reality - the perception of sharing the same beliefs and feelings about the world. We found that conversation partners who spontaneously talked more about ambiguous images perceived them as more real, and this effect was mediated by their sense of shared reality (Study 1). A 5-day daily diary study revealed that on days participants talked with a close partner more than usual, their experiences felt more real, and this effect was mediated by shared reality (Study 2). Experimentally introducing doubt in romantic couples' beliefs about their shared reality disrupted the effect of conversation on realness, with effects persisting one week later (Study 3). These studies suggest that conversations may heighten perceived realness by enhancing shared reality, highlighting the importance of interpersonal relationships in shaping people's sense of reality.

When postgraduate students join their program, they establish commonalities of inner states (feelings, beliefs, concerns) with members of different, intertwined groups. Are those commonalities perceived as distinct based on group type? If so, which type affects students the most? We address these questions leveraging the shared reality construct: the perceived commonality of inner states with others. In two empirical, longitudinal studies, we survey graduate students as they establish shared realities with small teams, their class cohort (cluster), and the broader school community. We show that each shared reality with different groups is perceived distinctively, and the one shared with cohort members has the strongest relationship with students' engagement with the program. We explore a shared reality antecedent and discuss interventions.

Understanding the effects of experiencing a shared reality—or lack thereof—is more pressing than ever in an increasingly remote and fragmented workplace. From teammates laughing at an inside joke to coworkers sharing the same reaction to a new company policy, everyday organizational life is replete with instances of shared reality—i.e., the perception of sharing thoughts, feelings, and beliefs in common with other people about the world (Hardin & Higgins, 1996; Higgins, Rossignac-Milon, & Echterhoff, 2021). Yet, shared reality as a construct has not been directly examined in organizational contexts. We assemble leading shared reality scholars to examine questions like: What are the benefits of experiencing a shared reality in one’s workplace relationships? What are the effects of being surrounded by coworkers who do not share one’s opinions, and how can workers reconcile a lack of shared reality? Finally, how can diverse teams leverage shared reality to unlock their potential? Four empirical papers provide converging evidence that experiencing a sense of shared reality with one’s coworkers plays a key role in social connection, prosocial behavior, trust, work meaningfulness, and the performance of individuals and teams. Shared Reality Predicts Prosocial Behavior, Work Meaningfulness, and Job Performance Author: Maya Rossignac-Milon; IESE Business School Author: Sandra Matz; Columbia Business School Consequences of Self-Censoring Unpopular Opinions Author: Sanaz Talaifar; Imperial College Business School Author: Ashwini Ashokkumar; New York U. Sharing Relevance to Build Common Ground Author: Federica Pinelli; Columbia Business School Author: E. Tory Higgins; Columbia Business School Diverse, but on the Same Page: Shared Reality Moderates the Effect of Team Diversity on Performance Author: Sandra Matz; Columbia Business School Author: Maya Rossignac-Milon; IESE Business School

Our study explores how communicating with audiences who hold opposite opinions about a target person can lead to a biased recall of the target's behaviors depending on whom a shared reality is created with. By extending the standard “saying-is-believing” paradigm to the case of two audiences with opposite attitudes toward a target person, we found that communicators evaluatively tune their message to the attitude of each audience. Still, their later recall of the target's behavior is biased toward the audience's attitude only for the audience with whom they created a shared reality. Shared reality creation was manipulated by receiving feedback that, based on the communicator's message, an audience was either able (success) or unable (failure) to successfully identify the target person, with the former creating a shared reality. These results highlight the importance of shared reality creation for subsequent recall when communicating with multiple audiences on a topic.

Regulatory mode theory distinguishes between two components, or modes, of effective self-regulation: locomotion and assessment. Locomotion refers to psychological state-to-state movement. Assessment refers to goal evaluation and means of goal achievement. The primary aim of this review is to synthesize the cognitive, neural, and social aspects and underpinnings of regulatory mode theory. This review also explores implications of regulatory mode theory on well-being and decision-making within and among groups and individuals. With an integrative research approach on the mechanisms and implications of regulatory mode theory across multiple domains and levels of analysis, we suggest new research directions by exposing lapses in the literature and by providing a foundation for novel explorations of regulatory mode theory.

When a person faces a stressor alongside someone else, do they get more or less stressed when the other person agrees that the situation is stressful? While an equally stressed partner could plausibly amplify stress by making the situation seem more real and worthy of distress, we find that social validation during co-experienced stressors reduces reactivity. Specifically, the psychological experience of shared reality calms some people down. In Study 1, 70 undergraduate females who jointly faced a stressful event with someone else reported feeling less anxious when the other person felt the same way about the stressor, relative to when the other person appraised the situation in the opposite way or provided no indication of their appraisal. These findings were reflected in participants' physiological reactivity, especially in the parasympathetic nervous system. In Study 2, we generalize these findings to co-experienced stressors in the daily lives of 102 heteronormative romantic couples in the New York City area. In line with tend-and-befriend theory, we found that shared reality during co-experienced stressors reduced anxiety for almost all females (99% of the sample) and for a minority of males (42% of the sample). Together, these findings unify major theories in health and social psychology by implying that shared reality reduces stressor reactivity, and that this effect is partially moderated by sex.

We propose that abstraction is an interpersonal process and serves a social function. Research on shared reality shows that in communication, people raise their level of abstraction in order to create a common understanding with their communication partner, which can subsequently distort their mental representation of the object of communication. This work demonstrates that, beyond building accurate models, abstraction also functions to build accurate models but also to build socially shared models - to create a shared reality.

Regulatory focus theory distinguishes between two different value concerns: promotion concerns with advancement and growth, and prevention concerns with safety and security. Since its publication more than 20 years ago, regulatory focus theory has generated a substantial amount of research and it has been applied to numerous organizational contexts. We identified four main domains: decision making, messaging, people management (e.g., leadership, organizational development, wellness and employees’ productivity), and entrepreneurship. We selected significant findings in those domains based on individuals, teams, and organizations being motivated by promotion or prevention goals and on the consequences of the match between regulatory focus goal orientation and the manner in which the goal is pursued, as conceptualized by regulatory fit theory. We also highlighted whether the research was concerned with the individual or with a broader group within the organization (including the organization itself). We conclude by suggesting future avenues for research.

Abstract We propose that abstraction is an interpersonal process and serves a social function. Research on shared reality shows that in communication, people raise their level of abstraction in order to create a common understanding with their communication partner, which can subsequently distort their mental representation of the object of communication. This work demonstrates that, beyond building accurate models, abstraction also functions to build accurate models but also to build socially shared models – to create a shared reality.

When people make decisions, they want the outcomes of their choice to be as positive as possible. But they also want the decision‐making process itself to be conducted in the right way. Though this is often described as making decisions that are moral or ethical, it also includes making decisions that are appropriate—that are suitable and fitting. We focus on this latter, overlooked interpretation, and propose that making the right decision is about effectively establishing what is true and real. We discuss three factors that can lead people to experience their decision‐making process as being right: (1) making a decision in the “right way”; (2) making a decision in a manner that “feels right” given the decision maker's current motivational orientation; and (3) making a decision based upon a “shared reality” with others. We review evidence that making the right decision in each of these ways intensifies the worth of a given chosen option.

This brief report explores developmental changes in motivation by adapting, for a sample of children spanning the ages of 4 to 17, measures of well-established motivational concerns, such as regulatory mode and regulatory focus concerns. The paper leverages a recently proposed developmental model of shared reality to interpret our results (Higgins, 2016). We established that assessment concerns increase throughout childhood until age 13, which is theorized to be the end of childhood according to the theory of shared reality development. Furthermore, we found that children after age 13, but not before that pivotal age, are similar to adults in how they differentiate between regulatory mode and regulatory focus concerns. Adopting the theory of shared reality development allowed us to highlight the importance of motivational concerns in development beyond the cognitive changes that are often utilized.