Perceptual Positions: How Seeing Things From Different Perspectives Can Resolve Conflict
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Perceptual positions is a concept used in Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) to explore a situation from three perspectives: your own, another person’s, and that of an outside observer. By examining our thoughts, emotions and assumptions from different viewpoints, we may gain a better understanding of interpersonal conflict, improve communication and identify new ways to respond. Although perceptual positions can be a useful reflection exercise, it is important to remember that imagining another person’s perspective does not mean we know exactly what they think or feel.
Why Do People Experience Conflict Differently?
In July 2021, during the Tokyo Olympic Games, American gymnast Simone Biles withdrew from several events after experiencing difficulties related to her mental health and concerns about her ability to perform safely. Her decision prompted widespread discussion about mental health, athletic performance, personal responsibility and the pressures faced by elite athletes. Reactions were divided. Many people praised Biles for prioritising her well-being and drawing attention to the psychological pressures of competitive sport. Others criticised her withdrawal, arguing that it affected her team and disappointed those who expected her to compete.
Why did the same decision provoke such different reactions?
People evaluated the situation through different expectations, experiences and values. Some prioritised an athlete’s mental health and safety, while others focused on competition, commitment and team responsibility. The discussion also raised questions about the intense pressures under which elite athletes perform. This example illustrates how people can interpret the same event in different ways. It also highlights the importance of understanding the perspectives from which people form their opinions.
Conflict is a common feature of human interaction. It can arise between individuals, within groups or even within a single person who is experiencing competing needs or values. Conflict is not necessarily harmful; when managed constructively, it can reveal differences, encourage discussion and lead to better decisions. However, unresolved conflict can damage relationships and make communication more difficult.
The American Psychological Association’s Dictionary of Psychology describes conflict in terms of opposing or incompatible forces, needs and demands. In interpersonal relationships, conflict commonly involves disagreement, tension or resistance between people whose interests, beliefs or actions differ.
One explanation for conflict is that people have different needs, expectations, values, goals and interpretations of events. Earlier theorists, including Sigmund Freud and Konrad Lorenz, also explored the role of aggression and instinct in human behaviour. However, conflict cannot be explained by a single cause. It may emerge from individual differences, misunderstandings, competition over resources, unequal power, social conditions or unmet needs. Understanding these differences is an important first step towards resolving disagreements.
What Are Perceptual Positions in NLP?
One way to approach conflict is to consider the situation from more than one point of view. This is the central idea behind perceptual positions, a concept developed within Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP).
The concept is commonly associated with John Grinder and Judith DeLozier’s work in the 1980s and was developed further by other NLP practitioners, including Robert Dilts. Perceptual positions encourages us to step outside our usual interpretation of an interaction and consider alternative perspectives. Rather than examining a disagreement only through our own thoughts and feelings, we deliberately explore how the situation might appear to the other person and how it might look to an outside observer.
The approach is often described as a form of modelling: we attempt to understand the assumptions, concerns and experiences that might influence another person’s behaviour. The phrase “walk a mile in someone else’s shoes” captures the underlying idea. We may not agree with another person’s actions, but considering their perspective can help us understand why they might have acted as they did.
It is important to distinguish perspective-taking from certainty. We cannot directly experience another person’s internal world simply by imagining it. Our understanding remains a hypothesis that can be refined through listening, asking questions and checking our assumptions. Within NLP, perceptual positions is often used in coaching, communication training, leadership development and relationship work. It can also be adapted as a personal reflection exercise. However, claims that it reliably resolves conflict or replaces formal market research and professional psychological support should be treated cautiously, as the evidence for NLP-specific methods is limited.
How Can Perceptual Positions Be Applied to Market Research?
Market research involves gathering and analysing information about customers, markets and products to help organisations make informed decisions. Researchers may investigate what customers need, how they behave, what they value and how they respond to a particular product or service. This information can help organisations reduce uncertainty and design more appropriate products, communications and customer experiences.
Perceptual positions offers a possible supplementary exercise for teams conducting this work. For example, imagine a company developing a new mobile banking application. The design team may believe that a feature-rich interface is ideal because it provides customers with more options. However, a customer who is unfamiliar with digital banking may find the same interface confusing or intimidating.
The team could explore the issue from three perspectives:
The designer’s perspective: What problem is the feature intended to solve? What assumptions are we making about the user’s knowledge and needs?
The customer’s perspective: What might a first-time user find confusing, reassuring or useful? What barriers might they encounter?
The observer’s perspective: What can we identify about the interaction between the interface, the user’s needs and the design team’s assumptions?
This exercise may help the team identify assumptions worth testing and develop more useful research questions.
However, perceptual positions cannot replace customer interviews, usability testing, surveys, behavioural data or other appropriate research methods. Imagining what customers might think is not equivalent to gathering evidence from actual customers. The strongest approach combines perspective-taking with direct research. The exercise can help a team formulate hypotheses, while customer feedback and observed behaviour help establish whether those hypotheses are accurate.
We do not have complete access to every detail of our own experiences, let alone those of other people. Our perceptions are influenced by attention, memory, expectations, emotions and previous learning. When we encounter someone whose behaviour we find frustrating, we may focus on the aspects of their behaviour that confirm our existing opinion of them. Their actions may appear unreasonable to us because we interpret them through our own values and assumptions.
For example, imagine that a colleague frequently questions your decisions during meetings. You may interpret this behaviour as an attempt to undermine your authority. The colleague, however, may believe they are identifying risks or contributing to better decisions.
Neither interpretation should automatically be treated as fact. The colleague may genuinely be acting disruptively, or there may be a misunderstanding about expectations and communication styles. The only way to establish more about their intentions is to seek additional information. Perceptual positions encourages us to explore these possibilities before deciding how to respond.
Within the NLP framework, an interpersonal problem may sometimes be understood as involving the internal representation we have formed of another person. If we expect someone to be hostile, we may interpret ambiguous behaviour as further evidence of hostility.
Reconsidering that interpretation may create room for a different response. However, this does not mean that conflict exists only in our minds. Some disagreements involve genuine incompatibilities, harmful behaviour or unequal power that cannot be resolved by changing our perspective alone. The goal is to understand the situation more fully, not to deny what has happened or excuse another person’s behaviour.
How Can Seeing Through Someone Else’s Eyes Build Empathy?
Empathy involves recognising and responding to another person’s emotional experience. Perspective-taking can contribute to empathy by encouraging us to consider the thoughts, feelings and circumstances that may influence another person’s behaviour.
Imagine a friend who has become distant and rarely initiates conversations. You might assume that they no longer value the friendship. From their possible perspective, they may be overwhelmed by work, dealing with personal difficulties or unsure how to ask for support. These are possibilities, not established facts. Asking your friend how they are doing may reveal more than repeatedly analysing their behaviour.
Perspective-taking can help us move from immediate judgement towards curiosity. It may also remind us that understanding someone’s reasons does not require us to agree with their actions.
A song by The Head and the Heart explores a related theme: the difference between how a person sees themselves and how someone who loves them sees them. The idea is that a person who feels broken or unworthy may struggle to recognise qualities that another person genuinely appreciates. This illustrates how different perspectives can shape our understanding of ourselves and our relationships. However, another person’s positive view is not the only measure of our worth, and changing our self-perception can require more than seeing ourselves through someone else’s eyes.
What Are the Three Perceptual Positions?
The NLP model commonly describes three positions. Each offers a different way of examining an interaction.
Position one: Through your own eyes
Position two: Through the eyes of the other person in your interaction/altercation
Position three: Fly on the wall observing the interaction, aka third person observer
Let’s explore each position in more detail.
What Is the First Perceptual Position?
The first position is your own point of view. In NLP, it is often described as an associated position because you mentally revisit the experience from within your own perspective. You consider what you noticed, what you thought was happening, how you felt and what you wanted to achieve.
Your interpretation may be influenced by your personal history, values, culture, expectations and current emotional state. Recognising these influences can help you understand why the interaction affected you in a particular way. For example, if a colleague interrupts you during a meeting, you might feel frustrated because you believe your contribution is being dismissed. You may also feel embarrassed, especially if other people are present.
The purpose of this position is not to prove that your interpretation is correct. It is to describe your experience as clearly as possible before considering other viewpoints.
Questions to explore in the first position include:
What happened from my point of view?
What did I see and hear?
What thoughts and emotions did I experience?
What did I interpret the other person’s behaviour to mean?
Which of my needs, beliefs or values felt challenged?
What did I want to happen in that moment?
How did I respond, both verbally and non-verbally?
What impact did the interaction have on me?
Why is resolving this disagreement important to me?
What outcome would I consider constructive?
Try to describe your emotions and observations specifically.
Instead of saying only, “I was angry,” you might say, “I felt angry when my colleague interrupted me because I interpreted it as dismissive. I noticed that I clenched my jaw, raised my voice and stopped listening carefully.”
This description distinguishes the emotion, the interpretation and the observable response. It provides a clearer starting point for understanding the interaction.
What Is the Second Perceptual Position?
The second position involves considering the situation from the other person’s point of view. Within the NLP framework, this is sometimes described as mentally stepping into the other person’s shoes. You attempt to consider what they may have noticed, what they might have been thinking and feeling, and what they may have wanted to achieve.
Return to the example of your colleague interrupting you during a meeting.
From your perspective, the interruption may have felt disrespectful. From the colleague’s possible perspective, they may have been worried about a deadline, eager to clarify a technical point or unaware that their behaviour was making it difficult for you to contribute. These explanations are possibilities, not facts. The purpose of this position is to develop questions and hypotheses rather than to claim certainty about another person’s internal experience.
You might ask:
What might the other person have noticed during the interaction?
What concerns or goals might have influenced their response?
What might they have believed was happening?
How might they have interpreted my words or behaviour?
What information might they have had that I did not?
What information might they have misunderstood?
What might they want me to understand about their position?
What could I ask them to clarify my assumptions?
This position can encourage empathy without requiring agreement or approval.
For instance, you may come to understand that your colleague was under pressure to finish a project. You can recognise that pressure while still explaining that repeated interruptions prevent you from contributing effectively.
Does Perspective-Taking Activate Mirror Neurons?
Mirror neurons are neurons identified in certain brain regions of non-human primates that respond during particular actions and when observing similar actions performed by others. Research in humans has also identified brain activity associated with observing and performing actions.
However, mirror-neuron research does not establish that imagining another person’s perceptual position activates a dormant set of neurons that reproduces their internal experience. Nor does it demonstrate that the NLP second position reliably accelerates learning through a specific mirror-neuron mechanism.
Empathy and perspective-taking involve multiple cognitive and emotional processes, and their neural basis is more complex than a single mechanism. The practical value of considering another person’s viewpoint does not depend on claiming that it recreates their experience inside your own nervous system.
What Is the Third Perceptual Position?
The third position involves stepping back from the interaction and imagining that you are observing it from outside.
In NLP, this is often described as the perspective of a neutral observer or a person watching a film. Rather than focusing exclusively on what you or the other person felt, you consider the interaction between both individuals. For example, when reviewing the disagreement with your colleague, you might notice that your colleague interrupted you, you responded sharply, and your colleague then became defensive. Each response may have influenced what happened next.
From this viewpoint, the conflict may appear less like a problem caused entirely by one person and more like an interaction in which both people’s responses contributed to the escalation. That conclusion should only be drawn when it fits the available evidence. Some conflicts involve one-sided intimidation, harassment or abuse; an observer perspective should not create a false equivalence between unequal behaviours.
The third position can be useful for examining communication patterns and identifying possible points of intervention.
Questions to consider include:
What would an outside observer notice about the interaction?
What did each person say or do?
At what point did the conversation become difficult?
How did each person’s response influence what happened next?
What assumptions or misunderstandings might have contributed to the disagreement?
What information is missing from my account?
What might each person need in order to move forward?
Is there a reasonable point of compromise?
What boundaries or practical changes might be necessary?
What would a constructive next step look like?
The observer position may help create psychological distance from an emotionally charged event. However, it does not guarantee complete objectivity. Our existing beliefs and biases can influence how we imagine an outside observer would interpret the situation.
Its value lies in creating an opportunity to examine the interaction from a different angle.
How Can You Practise Perceptual Positions in Everyday Life?
Perceptual positions can be practised as a structured reflection exercise. If you are new to the technique, begin with a recent, relatively low-intensity disagreement rather than a deeply distressing or traumatic experience.
For example, you might choose a minor misunderstanding with a friend, a disagreement with a colleague or a conversation in which you felt that your point of view was not understood. If the situation involves abuse, intimidation or a serious safety concern, prioritise safety and appropriate support rather than trying to resolve it through perspective-taking alone.
Step 1: Choose a Situation to Explore
Think of a specific interaction that you would like to understand better.
Avoid beginning with a broad judgement such as “My colleague is impossible.” Instead, identify a particular incident, such as a meeting in which you felt interrupted or a conversation that ended in disagreement. The more specific the situation, the easier it will be to distinguish what happened from what you believe it meant.
Step 2: Establish Three Separate Positions
In NLP, spatial anchoring refers to associating a particular experience or mental state with a physical location or cue.
For this exercise, you can use three separate places in a room. For example:
One spot represents your own perspective.
A second spot represents the other person’s possible perspective.
A third spot represents the observer’s perspective.
You do not have to move physically for the exercise to be useful, but using separate locations may help some people distinguish the three viewpoints. Treat these locations as reminders of the perspectives you are exploring, not as scientifically established anchors that automatically produce a particular mental state.
Step 3: Explore the First Position
Stand or sit in the first location and revisit the event from your own perspective. Notice your thoughts, feelings, bodily responses and interpretation of what happened. Try to identify the specific words or actions that affected you.
You might record a few observations:
My colleague interrupted me twice.
I interpreted the interruptions as a sign that my contribution was not valued.
I felt frustrated and embarrassed.
I raised my voice and stopped explaining my point.
I wanted to be heard and taken seriously.
Return to the present moment when you have finished reflecting.
Step 4: Explore the Second Position
Move to the second location and consider how the other person might have experienced the interaction. What might they have been trying to communicate? What pressures or concerns might have influenced their behaviour? How might they have interpreted your response?
Keep a clear distinction between what you know and what you are imagining.
For instance, you might consider that your colleague was worried about a deadline or believed that an urgent clarification was needed. You might also consider that they did not realise how often they interrupted you. Do not force yourself to invent a sympathetic explanation. The purpose is to explore plausible alternatives, not to justify the behaviour or dismiss your own experience.
When you have finished, return to the present moment.
Step 5: Explore the Third Position
Move to the third location and imagine observing the interaction from a distance.
Consider what each person said, how they responded to one another and what may have contributed to the disagreement. You might notice that your colleague interrupted you, you became frustrated, and your sharper response made the conversation more defensive. You might also recognise that the meeting structure gave neither person a clear opportunity to speak.
Ask yourself what could have changed the direction of the interaction.
Perhaps you could have said, “I’d like to finish this point, and then I’d be happy to hear your concern.” Perhaps your colleague could have waited until you finished speaking. Or perhaps the disagreement requires a separate conversation about meeting expectations.
Try to identify practical options rather than searching for a single person to blame.
Step 6: Return to Your Own Position
Return to the first location and review what you have learned.
Has anything changed in how you understand the situation? Have you identified an assumption that needs checking? Is there a boundary you need to communicate, a question you need to ask or a practical change worth proposing?
You may find a new way forward, or you may decide that your original interpretation remains the best-supported one. Either outcome can be useful.
The purpose of the exercise is not to force agreement or make every conflict disappear. It is to develop a more considered understanding of the situation and identify realistic choices for responding to it.
Step 7: Decide What to Do Next
Translate your reflection into a specific action.
For example, you might arrange a private conversation with your colleague and say:
“I wanted to revisit our discussion in the meeting. When I was interrupted several times, I found it difficult to explain my point. I’d like us to find a way for both of us to contribute while keeping the discussion focused.”
This approach describes the impact of the behaviour and invites a practical conversation without claiming to know the other person’s intentions. If the problem continues, you may need clearer boundaries, a manager’s involvement or another appropriate form of support. Reflection is most useful when it helps you decide what to do with the information you have gained.
What Are the Benefits and Limitations of Perceptual Positions?
Perceptual positions can offer several potential benefits as a reflective exercise.
1. Greater self-awareness
Exploring your own perspective can help you identify your assumptions, emotional responses and expectations. You may notice that a disagreement affects you because it touches on a value or concern that is especially important to you.
2. Perspective-taking and empathy
Considering another person’s possible viewpoint may help you recognise that their behaviour could have a different explanation from the one you initially assumed.
3. More balanced reflection
The observer position encourages you to consider the interaction as a whole rather than focusing exclusively on your own feelings or the other person’s actions. It can help you identify patterns and possible points of intervention.
4. Improved communication
By distinguishing observations from interpretations, you may be better prepared to ask questions, clarify misunderstandings and explain your needs.
5. A wider range of options
When you are no longer relying on a single interpretation, you may identify responses you had not previously considered. These could include having a conversation, setting a boundary, gathering more information or deciding that compromise is not appropriate.
There are also important limitations.
Imagining another person’s perspective does not reveal their actual thoughts or feelings. A neutral observer position is not automatically free from bias, and not every conflict can be resolved by changing how one person interprets it. Practical circumstances, incompatible needs and harmful behaviour may require direct action.
Perceptual positions is an NLP-based technique, and strong evidence establishing its specific effectiveness is limited. Its use as a reflection exercise should not be confused with proof that it is a validated standalone psychological treatment.
Conclusion: How Can a Different Perspective Change the Way We Respond?
Conflict often becomes more difficult when we assume that our own interpretation of a situation is the only reasonable one. We may focus on another person’s behaviour without considering the circumstances, expectations or misunderstandings that could have influenced the interaction. Perceptual positions offers a structured way to explore a disagreement through three viewpoints: our own perspective, the other person’s possible perspective and that of an outside observer.
Each position asks us to examine a different part of the interaction. Together, they can encourage greater self-awareness, more thoughtful perspective-taking and a clearer understanding of the choices available to us. However, empathy does not require us to agree with another person, excuse harmful behaviour or abandon our own needs. We can understand why someone might act in a particular way while still communicating boundaries and holding them accountable for their actions.
The next time you find yourself in a disagreement, consider pausing before deciding what the other person’s behaviour means. Ask what you know, what you are assuming and what you might learn by considering another perspective. You may discover a misunderstanding that can be resolved, a boundary that needs to be communicated or a difference that requires acceptance rather than agreement. Sometimes, the most useful change is not finding a way to prove that we are right. It is learning to understand the situation more fully so that we can choose how to respond.
References:
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Hui, J., Cashman, T., & Deacon, T. (2008). Bateson’s Method: Double Description. What is It? How Does It Work? What Do We Learn? Biosemiotics, 77–92. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-6706-8_6
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This article on 'Perceptual Positions' has been contributed by Rhema Blessie Merigala who is student of Amity University, Mumbai and peer reviewed by Saumya Joshi who is a psychology enthusiast, currently in third year of undergraduation from Vivekananda College, Delhi University.
Rhema and Saumya are both part of the Global Internship Research Program (GIRP), which is mentored by Anil Thomas.
GIRP is an initiative by (International Journal of Neurolinguistics & Gestalt Psychology) IJNGP and Umang Foundation Trust to encourage young adults across our globe to showcase their research skills in psychology and to present it in creative content expression.
Anil is an internationally certified NLP Master Practitioner and Gestalt Therapist. He has conducted NLP Training in Mumbai, and across 6 other countries. The NLP practitioner course is conducted twice every year. To get your NLP certification