Does everyone notice your embarrassing T-shirt?
The spotlight effect in social judgment: An egocentric bias in estimates of the salience of one’s own actions and appearance
Students wearing a Barry Manilow T-shirt thought loads of people noticed it. In reality, far fewer did.
College students were asked to put on a T-shirt with a big picture of singer Barry Manilow (not a cool choice among students at the time) and walk into a room full of peers.
Afterwards, the wearers guessed that about half the room had noticed their shirt. In fact, only around a quarter had. We all think we’re under a spotlight, but everyone else is busy worrying about their own shirt.
Nobody is looking at you as much as you think. Wear the shirt.