Is people Underestimate their ability?
Yes, people underestimate their
ability even they better than they think. People underestimate their ability at
stereotypically difficult tasks like playing chess, telling jokes, juggling or
computer programming.
Recently I covered the Dunning-Kruger effect which explains why the incompetent don't know they're
incompetent.
But there's a flip-side to the
Dunning-Kruger: sometimes the competent don't know when they're competent.
This is the worse-than-average
effect. This means that when you're good at something, you tend to assume that
other people are good at it as well. So, when you're faced with a difficult
task that you are good at, you underestimate your own ability.
It doesn't just kick in when we
have special skills, but also when we think that the odds are long, say because
the task is particularly difficult. For example Kruger (1999) found that people underestimate their ability at
stereotypically difficult tasks like playing chess, telling jokes, juggling or
computer programming.
On the other hand they overestimate
their ability at stereotypically easy tasks like using a mouse, driving a car
or riding a bicycle.
"University of Iowa students report
believing that they stand only a 6% chance of beating fellow University of Iowa
students in a trivia contest featuring questions on the history of Mesopotamia.
In contrast, a trivia contest featuring questions on TV sitcoms inspired an
average estimated probability of winning of 70%. Naturally, these beliefs are
erroneous because the tests will be simple or difficult for everyone. On
average, the actual probability of winning must be 50%."
How can we explain all this?
"When people compare themselves with their
peers, they focus egocentrically on their own skills and insufficiently take
into account the skills of the comparison group."
In other words we tend to forget
how good other people are at riding bicycles and how bad they are at telling
jokes or computer programming.
The same is true of judgements we
make about ourselves. For example older people tend to assume they are less
attractive and athletic than other people their own age.
The moral of the story is simple:
sometimes we do ourselves down, especially when faced with a difficult task or
when we have special skills. Under these circumstances we are better than we
know.
So, people never ever underestimate
yourself you’re better than you think.
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Image Source: http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1208672
Image Source: http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1208672
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