Why We All Stink as Intuitive Psychologists: The False Consensus Bias
Many people quite naturally believe they are good 'intuitive psychologists', thinking it is relatively easy to predict other people's attitudes and behaviours. We each have information built up from countless previous experiences involving both ourselves and others so surely we should have solid insights?
No such luck.
In reality people show a number of predictable biases when estimating other people's behaviour and its causes. And these biases help to show exactly why we need psychology experiments and why we can't rely on our intuitions about the behaviour of others.
One of these biases is called the false consensus bias. In the 1970s Stanford University social psychologist Professor Lee Ross set out to show just how the false consensus bias operates in two neat studies (Ross, Greene & House, 1977).
False consensus
In the first study participants were asked to read about situations in which a conflict occurred and then told two alternative ways of responding. They were asked to do three things:
- Guess which option other people would choose,
- Say which option they would choose,
- Describe the attributes of the person who would choose each of the two options.
The results showed more people thought others would do the same as them, regardless of which of the two responses they actually chose themselves. This shows what Ross and colleagues dubbed the 'false consensus' bias - the idea that we each think other people think the same way we do when actually they often don't.
Another bias emerged when participants were asked to describe the attributes of the person who made the opposite choice to their own. Compared to other people who made the same choice they did, people made more extreme predictions about the personalities of those who made didn't share their choice.
To put it a little crassly: people tend to assume that those who don't agree with them have something wrong with them! It might seem like a joke, but it is a real bias that people demonstrate.
Eat at Joe's!
While the finding from the first study is all very well in theory, how can we be sure people really behave the way they say they will? After all, psychologists have famously found little connection between people's attitudes and their behaviour.
In a second study, therefore, Ross and colleagues abandoned hypothetical situations, paper and pencil test and instead took up the mighty sandwich board.
This time a new set of participants, who were university students, were asked if they would be willing to walk around their campus for 30 minutes wearing a sandwich board saying: "Eat at Joe's". (No information is available about the food quality at 'Joe's', and consequently how foolish students would look.)
For motivation participants were simply told they would learn 'something useful' from the study, but that they were absolutely free to refuse if they wished.
The results of this study confirmed the previous study. Of those who agreed to wear the sandwich board, 62% thought others would also agree. Of those who refused, only 33% thought others would agree to wear the sandwich board.
Again, as before, people also made more extreme predictions about the type of person who made the opposite decision to their own. You can just imagine how that thinking might go. The people who agreed to carry the sandwich board might have said:
"What's wrong with someone who refuses? I think they must be really scared of looking like a fool."
While the people who refused:
"Who are these show-offs who agreed to carry the sandwich board? I know people like them - they're weird."
We're poor intuitive psychologists
This study is fascinating not only because it shows a bias in how we think about others' behaviours but also because it demonstrates the importance of psychology studies themselves.
Every psychologist has, at some point, been driven to distraction when trying to explain a study's finding by one form of the following two arguments (amongst others!):
1. I could have told you that - it's obvious!
2. No, in my experience that's not true - people don't really behave like that.
As this social psychology study shows, people are actually pretty poor intuitive psychologists. One of the few exceptions to this is when the answer is really really obvious, such as asking people whether it is OK to commit murder. But questions we can all agree on are generally not as interesting as those on which we are divided.
People are also more likely to assume someone who doesn't hold the same views as them has a more extreme personality than their own. This is because people think to themselves, whether consciously or unconsciously, surely all right-thinking (read 'normal') people think the same way as me?
Well, apparently not. Although knowing that we don't know other people is a great start.
And that is one good reason why we need psychology studies.
» Read more of the top 10 social psychology experiments.
Reference
Ross, L., Greene, D., & House, P. (1977). The false consensus phenomenon: An attributional bias in self-perception and social perception processes. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 13(3), 279-301.
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As a marketer I found this very interesting because I usually design my marketing materials based on how *I* would respond to them. I'd always implicitly assumed that every other "normal" person would respond the same way. This study makes me realise that assumption is hardly valid.
So, what's a marketer to do? Hire a psychologist? :)
- Ben
Of course, the proposition that everyone behaves like this has an appealing self-referential quality.
To take one example of a group which behaves differently, successful contrarian investors make their money by assuming that the common, less extreme behaviour will be the opposite of what they're doing, and by being right more often than they're wrong.
A few comments:
To the first poster: Yes, of course you hire a psychologist. Marketing psychology is a vibrant discipline in the field.
Ian: Yes, the contrarian approach to investing is interesting, but (and I'd have to dig to find the article), they don't tend to be significantly more successful than non-contrarian investors, since they i) still ground their behavior heuristically, and ii) there are those with better information and better access who profit from the contrarians' investing behavior. I call it the "bigger fish in the ocean" phenomenon. So the shorts don't do better on average than the longs.
Overall, we make wonderful intuitive psychologists: We are amazing as portable psychology labs wandering the earth, determining why people do what they do.
Makes for lousy science, but we still do it very well. And we confirm our findings every day! I know that's not what you meant, Jeremy, but that's the first thing that popped to mind.
What is interesting is that we do reach a point when intuition does become more reliable, when individuals can have a gut reaction to some event and know that something is "up," even though they aren't critically analyzing it, and that assessment is likely to be pretty accurate. It comes through extensive experience in the subject. Often, we consider these people experts, which, in psychological terminology, suggests that neural pathways have developed relevant to the topic that that facts and details become intuitive.
Indeed, by our best estimates, it takes about 10,000 of dedicated, conscious, directed thought to achieve this more accurate intuition.
I worked out the numbers once, and basically we're talking about a bit over 5 years at a full-time job.
Dr. Grumpus
Dr G., good point - and it raises the question of why more people don't practice achieving accurate intuitions as it would be incredibly useful.
Part of the problem is that we often don't get to find out if our intuitions are correct or not - what with them being locked inside other people's heads. This seriously hampers the learning process!
We often do get to confirm our intuitions (although I agree it is problematic in the human-interaction world). In the realm of human interactions, I found it often manifests in a sense that a commonly accepted assessment behind a behavior feels wrong. I recall my first experience with this: the Oklahoma City bombing. I had performed extended and in-depth research on terrorism, and when this event happened, I immediately knew that the bomber was not of Middle Eastern origin, as the networks were reporting. It just wasn't right. I knew that the assessment presented on T.V. by these "experts" was based on stereotypes and prejudice, and not grounded in a critical analysis of the situation.
Most folks don't develop these expert intuitions, however. Why not? How many of us can dedicate 10,000 hours of dedicated conscious attention to a subject?
Certainly working towards a Ph.D. qualifies with respect to attention and dedicated effort. And so does having a full-time job that allows one to focus on their one field exclusively.
Interestingly, in one of your other entries (concerning "learning happiness"), that the number of 10,000 hours rears its head again, this time informing us how much dedicated effort is needed to (possibly) rewire your neural pathways for happiness.
Dr. Grumpus
very interesting study - i can see a lot of sense in it. i have a comment.
how about situations where people think others would definitely not do what they do?
'i donate 10% of my salary to the poor, how many would do that much? i bet hardly any. there aren't that many good people in this world'.
'i made a mistake by breaking up with her, i bet nobody in my position would have ever done that. what a highly stupid decision by me!'
though these are negative statements (i think people would not do what i did), i believe these too constitute bias - anti-consensus bias?
~ganesh
Anon,
There are a great number of potential biases in the examples you cite. Here are two:
Fundamental Attribution Error (aka Correspondence Bias)
Counterfactual Thinking ("what if" thinking)
For example, the notion of Self-Serving Bias (part of FAE): We consistently find that folks tend to overestimate their own qualities (be that driving ability, degree of honesty, overall health, generosity...) when compared to other people.
All you have to do is ask folks, on a scale of 1-10, (one being the worst, 5 being the average, and 10 being the best), where do they assess themselves on each of these abilities/qualities. You'll find the average of responses typically range from 6-8 (that is, most people consider themselves above average). I've been doing this survey in my classes for some seven years now, without any deviation from those results.
(I do occasionally have some fun with individual responses, especially with that rare person who rates their honesty as very very low. "Yup...I tend to lie a lot...").
As for counterfactual thinking and breaking up, there is research suggesting that the "leavers" in relationships actually tend to experience more emotional distress over the breakup decision as compared to the "left".
Dr. Grumpus
To Ben- as a marketer you have to look at who you are marketing to. If everyone you were marketing to shared the exact same opinion as you, you wouldn't have a job. and in response to your "normal" comment... define normal.
Jeremy-
And intuition is not something you can develop. You either have it or you don't. It is kind of like animal nature. The question is not can you increase your ability to be intuitive, it is can you increase your ability to use the intuition that you were given. To interpret what your intuition is saying. Intuition is a gift if you have it.
Dr. Grumpus, are you a professor or something? and if you are then, if you don't mind me asking, why do you participate in online blogs? Don't you have more important things to do? You are obviously extremely intellectual, I enjoyed reading about your studies.
Mar e. t., for me intuition is just another word for unconscious processing of information, so sure some of us may have a genetic advantage, but that doesn't mean it can't be developed.
And - what could be more important than commenting on blogs? :-)
I belive that intuitive psychology is more useful than this article poses. My reasoning is that if it was poor in its purpose then from an evolutionary standpoint this trait would be weeded out. This does not appear to be the case. From my own personal experience with regards to people I have social contact it proves effective though I can understand there being a diminished benefit in the trait when emplemented on a larger scale and encompassing individuals we have little or no social contact with.
So why did those people choose the sandwich board? Why did the others choose not to wear the sandwich board?
The experiment seems to suggest that the choices are equal, but are they?
The subjects were told that they'd learn something by wearing the sandwich board. That might indicate that the subjects needed to be encouraged to wear the signs.
Those people who chose to wear the signs had made a positive commitment. Were their responses different than the in kind or degree than those who made the negative commitment of not wearing the signs?
BTW did anyone ever actually walk around with Eat at Joes strapped to their back?
Just curious.
Buzz Cook
Buzz, the experiment wasn't focussed on individual's own decision-making processes. Instead it was more interested in what people thought others would do. Researchers wanted to find out how decisions or attitudes we hold ourselves affect our guesses about what's going on in other people's minds.
Yes, the people who agreed to wear the sandwich board did actually have to do it!
As a computer programmer, I am painfully aware of the fact that I don't think the same way as everyone else. So many times I have designed, or my team has designed, an interface that makes perfect sense to me (or even "us". Amongst a group of similar people there is most probably a bias towards thinking the same way) but when we test it out on the users they get confused and don't know what to do.
The trouble for programmers is that you can't just let a normal user design an interface either. We have tried that and we ended up with
a.) a frustrated user/designer
b.) an interface we couldn't make work
c.) many confused users who didn't think the same way as the first one who helped design the interface.
The best solution seems to have been to design something that fits the largest audience and allow users to customise the interface themselves so that those weirdos who are different can believe that they are the normal ones and everyone else is weird.
What is interesting is that we do reach a point when intuition does become more reliable, when individuals can have a gut reaction to some event and know that something is "up," even though they aren't critically analyzing it, and that assessment is likely to be pretty accurate. It comes through extensive experience in the subject.
dr g, I'm not sure I agree that intuition becomes reliable with experience in a subject. I agree with mar e. t. that it is nature not nurture that provides intuition. If experience told you that domestic terrorism was to blame for the Okla City bombing, I would attribute that to instincts developed from your training. Certainly psychologists and profilers worth their salt should be able to claim some competency in describing the typical behaviors of an assortment to personality types. I wouldn't call them seers or visionaries. If it is from the gut, it is based on experience, as you said. None of us are particularly reliable at prognostication, though.
I enjoy this blog site and have been visiting it often over the past few weeks since I discovered it.
As for future articles, I'd be very interested in reading a piece on the problem of reliability and how it manifests itself in psychology - as validity, repeatability, and/or trustworthiness of reporting by patients, doctors, caregivers, or researchers.
Dave, interesting perspective - thanks.
Hurst08, glad you like it. Perhaps I will do something on reliability and validity. Although, to be honest, these topics can be a bit dry compared to exciting experiments. It's vital stuff though.