Do we advise as one likes? The alignment bias in social advice giving

We often give advice to influence others, but could our own advice also be shaped by the very individuals we aim to influence (i.e., advisees)? This reverse flow of social influence—from those typically seen as being influenced to those who provide the influence—has been largely neglected, limiting our understanding of the reciprocal nature of human interactions. Here, we conducted a series of experiments and applied computational modelling to systematically investigate how advisees’ opinions shape the advice-giving process. In an investment game, participants (n = 346, across four studies) provided advice either independently or after observing advisees’ opinions (Studies 1 & 2), with feedback on their advice (acceptance or rejection) provided by advisees (Studies 3 & 4). Our findings consistently reveal that advisors tend to adjust their advice to align with the advisees’ opinions (we refer to this as the alignment bias), even when this compromises advice accuracy (Study 1). This tendency, which is demonstrated to be a deliberate pursuit rather than merely a result of opinion contagion, persists when advisors have a direct incentive to provide accurate advice (Study 2). However, as feedback is introduced, advisors’ behavior shifts, adapting to advisees’ preferences (“advising as one likes”), as described by a reinforcement learning model suggesting advisors’ intention to seek acceptance from advisees underlies the alignment bias (Study 3), even when acceptance is rare (Study 4). Collectively, our findings highlight advisors’ susceptibility to seeking acceptance, which can lead to counterproductive impacts on decision-making processes and misinformation exacerbation in social encounters.