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Author Topic: "Unskilled and unaware of it"  (Read 8574 times)
Murgos
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on: June 20, 2004, 08:01:16 AM

Article in the APA (American Psychological Association - link shamelessly borrowed from Cringley)

http://www.apa.org/journals/psp/psp7761121.html

In a nutshell it says that people who are not competent are not capable of knowing they are not competent.

We see this every day here on these boards and particularly on any games official boards.

Quote
People tend to hold overly favorable views of their abilities in many social and intellectual domains. The authors suggest that this overestimation occurs, in part, because people who are unskilled in these domains suffer a dual burden: Not only do these people reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the metacognitive ability to realize it. Across 4 studies, the authors found that participants scoring in the bottom quartile on tests of humor, grammar, and logic grossly overestimated their test performance and ability. Although their test scores put them in the 12th percentile, they estimated themselves to be in the 62nd. Several analyses linked this miscalibration to deficits in metacognitive skill, or the capacity to distinguish accuracy from error. Paradoxically, improving the skills of participants, and thus increasing their metacognitive competence, helped them recognize the limitations of their abilities.


Edit:  I wanted to point out that they are saying this effect is not dependent upon native intelligence.

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Big Gulp
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Reply #1 on: June 20, 2004, 08:16:00 AM

Quote from: Murgos
Across 4 studies, the authors found that participants scoring in the bottom quartile on tests of humor, grammar, and logic grossly overestimated their test performance and ability.


Okay, I understand how you can test logic and grammar, but how in the hell does one test humor?  Do you get a low score if you tell knock knock jokes and puns?  If you don't laugh at the right jokes?  I can't think of anything more subjective than a sense of humor, so how in God's name have these pinheads been able to quantify it?
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Reply #2 on: June 20, 2004, 08:26:53 AM

I think the people doing the tests are overconfident in their ability to test competence.
Murgos
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Reply #3 on: June 20, 2004, 09:04:38 AM

Quote from: Big Gulp
Quote from: Murgos
Across 4 studies, the authors found that participants scoring in the bottom quartile on tests of humor, grammar, and logic grossly overestimated their test performance and ability.


Okay, I understand how you can test logic and grammar, but how in the hell does one test humor?  Do you get a low score if you tell knock knock jokes and puns?  If you don't laugh at the right jokes?  I can't think of anything more subjective than a sense of humor, so how in God's name have these pinheads been able to quantify it?


RTFA?

edit:  It's a well written article with even a bit of humor and not very hard to read at all.  If you can't follow statistical probability just ignore the numbers and read the conclusions and accept that they are showing numbers that directly correspond to thier conclusions.

To answer your question they were not measuring sense of humor they were measuring ability to judge what OTHERS would find funny.  There are people who are VERY VERY good at this in the world, they are called comedians.  If you ask 10 professional comedians if they think someone else will find something funny and they all say yes and then you ask Joe Bagoddonuts if he thinks someone else will find that thing funny and he says no.  Whose answer do you weight toward the top end of your scale and whose answer to the bottom?  It's relative, certainly, but it's relative within an acceptible repeatable margin of accuracy, which makes it valid.

"You have all recieved youre last warning. I am in the process of currently tracking all of youre ips and pinging your home adressess. you should not have commencemed a war with me" - Aaron Rayburn
Mi_Tes
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Reply #4 on: June 20, 2004, 09:10:49 AM

From the same article:
Quote
Thomas Jefferson once said, "he who knows best best knows how little he knows.

and also
Quote
Thomas Gray was right: Ignorance is bliss– at least when it comes to assessments of one's own ability.


So true, at work, every year we have staff evaluate themselves and then their supervisor evaluate them.  It is always the case where the lowest performing persons in the office rate themselves the highest.  And when they are interviewing for a promotion, when asked what position they would like in 3 years is always the top position in the company (no matter if they have no college education and no advanced skills).  Makes you just want to shake them and say get a fucking clue.  Instead, when you don't promote them or give them an increase, they blame it all on you (because of course they could never be wrong).

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daveNYC
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Reply #5 on: June 20, 2004, 12:03:31 PM

This was old news.  The article I read used the example of a bank robber who was caught on camera, at the bank, no disguise, when robbing the place.  After he was picked up by the police he couldn't understand how they had found him, saying "But I used the lemon juice."

He had confused the use of lemon juice in invisible ink with ACME vanishing cream from the Road Runner cartoons.
SirBruce
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Reply #6 on: June 20, 2004, 12:07:45 PM

Yes, people were talking about this study a few years back.  Very interesting, and it certainly explains some of the stupidity in the world.  But it doesn't explain all of it.  What about the people who try to cover up their incompetence or shift the blame on others?

Bruce
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Reply #7 on: June 20, 2004, 12:47:13 PM

Yeah, apparently this subject was in vogue three years ago.

Hey, lets talk about the suits who have been cutting down on training as a cost-cutting measure.   Unskilled and unaware of it?   Yeah, maybe because our bosses are telling us that we're as skilled as we need to be and to "just wing it".

Though if lack of training was really an issue, I have to wonder why they bother to send all this work overseas to countries who are said to do an inferior job.

Sounds a lot like an excuse to me.

Also, looks like this article is an interesting reply to the "Unskilled and Unaware of It" article.    They point out that a great deal of the examples quoted in the article were self-limiting and the article utterly failed to take into consideration the big picture.

Roac
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Reply #8 on: June 21, 2004, 06:22:17 AM

I'd say that fits in with my experiences of others.  I think it extends beyond that though, to include about any self-grading exercise.  People have extreme difficulty finding fault in themselves, whether it is in how much they know on a subject, how moral they are, or how well they fit in in a particular situation.  Example?  People who are lousy judges of character, but won't take anyone's advise no matter how many friends point problems out.  People who are told they have an annoying or rude habbit, but figure it's "not that bad".  Or to cast a very broad net, how many evil dictators really think themselves evil?  

People tend to think they know a lot, they're basically good, and the problems are outside themselves.  And it makes sense - it would suck walking around thinking about how crappy a person you are, or how stupid you are, and I think the reasoning that goes into why people who know so little about a subject can't grade themselves applies to these other areas.

-Roac
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Dark Vengeance
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Reply #9 on: June 21, 2004, 08:00:11 AM

Quote from: Roac
People have extreme difficulty finding fault in themselves, whether it is in how much they know on a subject, how moral they are, or how well they fit in in a particular situation.


I don't think it's just about the self-image of themselves as the protagonist in life, but also that people remember the circumstances and reasoning behind their decisions. Ultimately, even if a mistake is made, there tends to be a 'here is what I was trying to do', or other rationalization for their error. This quickly converts itself into a mindset of 'I did the best I could, based on what I knew at the time'.

Folks tend to believe that doing their best is going to be good enough most of the time....or at least average. That's why I can see someone testing in the 12th percentile, but projecting themselves in the 62nd percentile.

Bring the noise.
Cheers.............
Murgos
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Reply #10 on: June 21, 2004, 08:06:10 AM

Quote from: geldonyetich
Also, looks like this article is an interesting reply to the "Unskilled and Unaware of It" article.    They point out that a great deal of the examples quoted in the article were self-limiting and the article utterly failed to take into consideration the big picture.


Um, no it doesn't.  The article you linked to says that cluelessness isn't all that bad in some respects.  That in some ways our modern economy relies upon unwarrented optimism by the clueless.  That Slate article makes no attempt to refute any of the claims made by the original report or to challenge thier methodology in any way.

Sure maybe it is important that the majority of people don't understand thier lack but that has almost nothing to do with the original report which was merely documenting the phenomena.

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HaemishM
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Reply #11 on: June 21, 2004, 09:21:51 AM

Quote from: SirBruce
What about the people who try to cover up their incompetence or shift the blame on others?


I've generally found with myself that when I do something so completely braindead and stupid, I'm not trying to be a fuckup, I just fuckup. Fuckups almost always are discovered at some point. Sometimes someone else points out your fuckup, and sometimes you discover your fuckup on your own after the fact. People who discover their own fuckup and can't take the consequences of said fuckup are usually the ones who work twice as hard to cover up the fuckup or make sure it's blamed on someone else than they actually worked on the thing they fucked up in the first place. As DV said, they do a lot of rationalization.

I'll have to read the article when I have time.

cevik
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Reply #12 on: June 21, 2004, 03:24:28 PM

Quote from: Roac
And it makes sense - it would suck walking around thinking about how crappy a person you are, or how stupid you are..


It does suck.. I find that a daily dose of vicodin and excessive alcohol consumption is just barely enough to keep me from ending it all..

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Nebu
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Reply #13 on: June 21, 2004, 04:57:21 PM

A few observations from an academician:

1) Most people are poorly calibrated.  This supports many of the assertions in this work.  I've tested this repeatedly and find that only the people in the top 2-sigma tend to reliably assess their performance (at least in an academic setting).  

2) Many people attempt to follow paths that are desired by outside influence rather than follow their strengths.  This is a shortcoming of this article in that most people are good at something.  The problem becomes one of societal values in that often people fail to recognize their strengths if said strengths don't coincide with skills valued by society.  I believe that humanity would be better served if people strove to follow their strengths rather than focus on what they perceive their parents/friends/relatives think they should do.  I also think that most people that do what they are best at often are rewarded for their skills.

Or for comic value, I think George Carlin used to say that "It's frightening to think about the intelligence of the average american... it's even scarier when you realize half of them are dumber than that."

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Paelos
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Reply #14 on: June 22, 2004, 06:56:52 AM

I often have those moments when I'm playing poker or listening to people argue when I know things have taken a turn for the worse. I can see that someone has made a critical error and is inevitably walking into a beartrap. It's not something I get from The Force or anything like that, it's simple analytical reasoning. If fourth street comes up with the third spade in no limit holdem, and somebody goes in, you should probably realize your high card ace isn't gonna hold up. Or when people start basing arguments entirely on facts they pulled off conspiracy theorist sites on the internet, despite overwhelming odds to the contrary. Yet they blaze on into the mathematical impossibilities that they might be correct.

The point is I'm often awed at how powerful denial can be in the human mind, especially those that are ill-equipped for higher reasoning. Some would rather deal with the long odds of winning than to walk away and admit defeat. It's simply a form of hubris. These people who can't diagnose their own incompetance suffer from that same kind of pride. They can't fathom that they could be at the bottom rung of society because their point of view is so skewed. Inevitably, there has to be a top and a bottom to every group, but I believe the knowledge of knowing that you existed at the bottom is a dangerous thing. When you know you are the worst at a game, you stop playing. What about knowing you are the worst at life?

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Dark Vengeance
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Reply #15 on: June 22, 2004, 07:21:45 AM

Quote from: Nebu
The problem becomes one of societal values in that often people fail to recognize their strengths if said strengths don't coincide with skills valued by society.  I believe that humanity would be better served if people strove to follow their strengths rather than focus on what they perceive their parents/friends/relatives think they should do.  I also think that most people that do what they are best at often are rewarded for their skills.


All sorts of people have skills that are relatively worthless to society. Like the guys that can stack/unstack cups really fast, or folks that have all the Vice Presidents memorized.

Then you've got to consider the folks whose biggest strength still isn't strong enough to turn it into a career....like a college athlete that ends up riding a fair amount of pine. For example, placekicker Katie Hnida had better be good at something other than kicking footballs. Another great example would be the wide variety of no-talent morons trying out for Last Comic Standing or American Idol.

Some people shovel shit for a living...and it's not because it was their greatest strength, or because it is what society or their family wanted them to do. It's just the reality of having a marketable skill that holds some value to others. Folks without that end up shovelling shit, or working some other mundane job.

Unless you start paying $50,000+ annual salaries for masturbation, goofing off at the office, and consuming obscene amounts of alcohol without dying, most folks are never going to make a living at what they do best. Thus, following another path is required for survival.

Bring the noise.
Cheers.............
Paelos
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Error 404: Title not found.


Reply #16 on: June 22, 2004, 07:46:50 AM

Quote from: Dark Vengeance

Unless you start paying $50,000+ annual salaries for masturbation, goofing off at the office, and consuming obscene amounts of alcohol without dying, most folks are never going to make a living at what they do best. Thus, following another path is required for survival.


I was tops in my graduating class in two out of three of those fields. It would have been three for three but one guy managed to beat off while eating, a skill I just couldn't master.

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TripleDES
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Reply #17 on: June 22, 2004, 07:49:57 AM

Quote from: Paelos
Or when people start basing arguments entirely on facts they pulled off conspiracy theorist sites on the internet, despite overwhelming odds to the contrary. Yet they blaze on into the mathematical impossibilities that they might be correct.

Sadly with the Internet turning into a common commodity in the middle class, this is happening over and over nonstop all the fucking time. It's only worse on the Internet itself. If they'd keep their misguided wisecracking on the Internet, I wouldn't care so much, I can ignore online diatribe by not surfing websites, but when you've some nimrod spewing his diatribe right into your left ear, then it's not funny anymore.

Bears the question, why a lot of people are attracted to these REALLY stupid conspiracy theories (and other diatribe) like flies are attracted to shit. Truth must be really boring.

Quote from: Paelos
Inevitably, there has to be a top and a bottom to every group, but I believe the knowledge of knowing that you existed at the bottom is a dangerous thing.

If you notice that you're about to find out that you tend more towards the bottom than the top, do something against it. Go to a fucking school, or learn it yourself, whatever, just do something. I came to the conclusion years ago, that admitting a defeat and learning from the mistakes (and doing something preemptively against it) pays out better on long term. It's better to look like a dumbass once as soon as possible than looking like the biggest idiot on earth when you're past the point of no return.

Anyway, it might be pride why a lot of people don't want to admit a defeat, but when someone's fucking up royally all the time, you'd expect that they'll notice it themselves... somewhen. Sadly personal experience at former workplaces, and also within my "monkeysphere", opposes exactly that.

And stuff.

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