Human Observers Are Accurate in Judging Personal Relationships in Real-life Settings: A Methodological Tool for Human Observational Research

One limitation of the naturalistic observation method is that it is understudied how accurately personal relationships may be judged by observers in real-life settings. To assess this judgment accuracy, we observed 285 dyads of individuals in public places and then questioned whether they were affiliated or strangers. Human observers were found to have a very high accuracy in judging peoples’ actual personal relationships. Moreover, several non-verbal cues, including direct interaction and age similarities, were identified as correlates of affiliation. We conclude that researchers may accurately judge personal relationships from non-verbal observational data and recommend that this should be utilized as a methodological tool in naturalistic observational studies.