Looking for a phrase for when two people assume the same thing about one another resulting in a stalemate

Question

I was discussing with a friend about a rather common situation that had occurred to them and I was wondering if there was a phrase or specific terminology used to describe it:

Person A makes an assumption about Person B.
Person B makes the same assumption about Person A.
Both Person A and Person B decide to withhold mutually desired actions due to the assumption that they have both drawn about each other, resulting in a stalemate.

This is commonly seen when two individuals who like each other are unable to take the next step in the courtship process because they assume that one person does not wish to be with the other intimately.

My best effort:

Inaction due to mutual misunderstanding.

user289476 · Accepted Answer

Psychological Noise

Perceptions, biases, and assumptions that interfere with the successful transmission and reception of messages.

Reference: Rothwell,Dan J. ''In the Company of Others: An Introduction to Communication''. New York: McGraw Hill, 2004

Psychological noise results from preconceived notions we bring to conversations, such as racial stereotypes, reputations, biases, and assumptions. When we come into a conversation with ideas about what the other person is going to say and why, we can easily become blinded to their original message. Most of the time psychological noise is impossible to free ourselves from, and we must simply strive to recognize that it exists and take those distractions into account when we converse with others.

Reference: Wikipedia

Zebrafish · Answer

Mexican standoff

A Mexican standoff is a confrontation amongst two or more parties in which no strategy exists that allows any party to achieve victory. As a result, all participants need to maintain the strategic tension, which remains unresolved until some outside event makes it possible to resolve it.
Mexican standoff

This exact situation played out for about half of last century during the Cold War. The doctrine commonly adopted was MAD, mutually assured destruction, a type of stalemate.

Edit: This definitely doesn't apply to your courtship example.

A more general term might be:

impasse

A situation that is so difficult that no progress can be made; a deadlock or a stalemate: American Heritage Dictionary

or deadlock

a state of affairs in which further action between two opposing forces is impossible; stalemate Collins English Dictionary

Bookeater · Answer

I'd like to make a case for the term communication breakdown here.

a lack of communication; a failure to exchange information
He blamed the mistake on a communication breakdown between two members of staff.

Reference:
https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/communication-breakdown

lbf · Answer

reach an impasse TFD

to progress to the point that a barrier stops further progress

As in:

Their debate, with identical but unknown shared agendas, had reached an
  impasse.

Looking for a phrase for when two people assume the same thing about one another resulting in a stalemate

4 Answers

Psychological Noise

Add your own answers!

Ask a Question