the glossary · cognitive bias
what is the mere-exposure effect?
mere-exposure effect
The mere-exposure effect is our tendency to prefer things simply because we have encountered them repeatedly. Robert Zajonc demonstrated it in 1968 using nonsense words and random shapes: more exposures, more liking, with no other reason available. It works on faces too. Which means a real amount of what gets called chemistry is proximity wearing a very good disguise. The coworker, the flatmate's friend, the person in your seminar. Familiarity is doing part of the work and it feels identical to being drawn to someone. That isn't a reason to distrust it. It's a reason to notice how much of it showed up before they did anything.
where it comes from: Zajonc, 1968 ↗
this one has a whole chapter under it. read: why you like who you like →
also asked
does being around someone make you attracted to them?
Often, yes. Repeated exposure reliably increases liking, and proximity is one of the strongest predictors of who people end up with. It does not manufacture attraction out of nothing, but it does a lot of quiet work that usually gets credited to fate.
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