30 Thinking Mistakes That Make Us Live By Patterns

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

To make our thinking process easier, our brains have invented cognitive distortions. Unfortunately, he overdid it. If you want to think outside the box and think broadly, get rid of distortion-imposed boundaries.

Cognitive distortions are bugs in our minds, algorithms that have appeared for a good purpose - to protect the brain from overload. But it turns out that not all protection is created equal. Sometimes these algorithms work where they shouldn't and make us wrong.

We have already talked about the mistakes of thinking, because of which we do not understand anything. They help to filter information and not go crazy with the constant flow of new knowledge. Today we will understand the distortions that help us cope with the sad fact that we are poorly aware.

The world is huge, a person learns all his life and still knows very little about it. We just do not have time to learn everything about the world around us. But you have to live somehow. And our brain draws its own picture of the world, as if writing a fantastic book. We exist inside it.

Sometimes this picture is very different from reality. To act correctly, you need to go beyond the canvas.

Let's figure out what mechanisms are preventing this.

We see logic where there is none

We make up the world like a mosaic. The faster it develops, the easier it is for us. Therefore, sometimes we fold the pattern at our discretion.

Anthropomorphism

We attribute human properties to groups of people, animals, and even natural phenomena. And then we think that they really can behave like people. Remember, in fairy tales, the heroes constantly communicated with the wind, sun, gray wolves? In some form, we have not shaken off such a mythical perception.

Pareidolia

This is a visual illusion, when in a jumble of random lines, points and figures, we see some kind of complete object. When a monster "crawls" out of the darkness under the bed, and the lunar landscape folds into the figure of a hare, this is pareidolia.

Clustering illusion

We find patterns where there are none. “I wore this sweater twice for an interview, twice received an invitation to work. And for the third interview I put on a shirt, everything was bad. So the sweater is happy. Not really.

Illusory correlation

This is also about finding non-existent patterns. We easily notice things that stand out from others: pictures in the text, colored posters on gray walls, a tall man among the undersized. But this is not enough for us.

If we notice two outstanding things, we will try to find a connection between them and find, even if there is none.

Distortion works when we form opinions about people, especially foreigners. For example, we meet a New Zealand citizen, which is unusual in itself. It turns out that he is obsessed with coffee. Our brains will decide that they are a coffee fan because they are from New Zealand.

Underestimating sample size

This is a distortion that shows that we do not know how to handle statistics at all. Statistics work well with large samples, but poorly with small ones. But we cannot appreciate this and expect that in small groups the same principles apply as in large ones.

It works the other way too. For example, a poor student was abandoned by two girls for the sake of wealthy guys. The student decides that all women are mercantile and think only about money. And he is mistaken for life.

Good Cause Error

This is a distortion that is associated with the inability to think logically. There is such a law: if one object has property A, and the second object has no such property, then these objects are not the same. For example, a bicycle has pedals, but a scooter does not. So the scooter is not a bicycle. Is it logical? Exactly as long as we know everything about objects. But if our knowledge is not enough, the law fails.

For example, money was stolen from me. I know a thief is a criminal. And I know that my friend Sasha is not a criminal. So Sasha didn't steal my money. Therefore, I will be very surprised when the police find the stolen goods from Sasha's house.

Player error

It seems to us that a chain of random events affects the next event. If the coin falls five times upside down, then the sixth time will definitely be heads. In fact, the probability of getting heads is 50%. The same as it was when the coin was thrown for the first time.

Novelty effect

It seems to us that recent events affect the world more than those that happened long ago. For example, on Monday you went to the pool, on Tuesday to the gym, and on Wednesday you were sick. You will most likely think that you caught the infection in the gym, although you could have caught it in the pool.

We think in a pattern

Our brains hate the unknown. We must know everything and understand everything. Therefore, any new information urgently needs to be tamped into the system that is familiar to us. And if the information contradicts our beliefs, then we can easily come up with some explanation for this, and no one will convince us.

Fundamental attribution error

When we think of others, we attribute their actions to personal qualities. For example, why did a colleague yell at me? Because he's a goat. And when we think about ourselves, we explain behavior by external factors. Why did I yell at a colleague? Because he's a goat.

The consequence is a group attribution error. We attribute the properties of the entire group to each of its representatives, and vice versa. Remember the New Zealander who loved coffee? We will think that all New Zealanders love coffee.

Stereotyping

Getting rid of attribution errors is so difficult that we ask every New Zealander why he suddenly doesn't like coffee? We know they are all coffee lovers there.

Functional tightness

If we know how to use an object, then we cannot use it otherwise. What can you do with an empty aluminum can? Crumple and discard. Or construct a burner out of it. When we overcome this distortion, true creativity begins.

The effect of moral trust

Reputation effect. If a person is a model in something for a long time, makes the right decisions, then this is taken for granted. And the person himself begins to believe that his decisions are good only because he made them.

Faith in a just world

We believe that all villains will get what they deserve, and the truth will someday win, people will treat us the way we treat them, and all offenders will be punished by karma / god / universe / macaroni monster. This is a distortion of the causal relationship, which we interpret in such a way that it would be calmer and more pleasant for us to live.

Submission to authority

We tend to do what our bosses, authorities and in general higher people tell us, and we follow orders, even if we do not agree with them.

Templates rule us

We love templates so much that we create them almost instantly, and we are not even going to revise them.

Halo effect

The overall impression of a person affects everything we think of him. Beautiful people seem smarter, neat people seem more professional. So they fall in love at first sight, and then they ask where the brains were.

Distortion in assessing the homogeneity of another group

People whom we do not consider “ours” seem to us more the same than they are. Hence the jokes about how Koreans go through control with one passport.

Distortion in favor of your group

The people we consider “ours” seem to us better than others. It works both on a large scale (urban ones are not like that, our people are more fun), and on small ones.

We can refuse other people's inventions and achievements just because they are aliens.

Cheerleading effect

If a person is in a group in which everyone is somewhat similar, he looks more attractive. We have written in detail about this effect and how to use it.

Devaluation of opinion

We cannot perceive information in isolation from the one who presents it. And if something says “our” person, then we perceive the proposal as sensible, and if “someone else's”, then we look for flaws in it.

"Let's decorate the office for the holiday!" - says a colleague. If this is a reputable designer, then this is a great idea. And if this is a newcomer from the security department that no one knows, then there is absolutely no need to waste time on such nonsense.

We do not know how to count

The subconscious mind does not like numbers, it likes everything to be "by eye" and "approximately". Therefore, we round and simplify any numerical values.

Denying probability

Our brain does not know the theory of probability at all. Therefore, when a decision needs to be made, and knowledge is not enough, small risks are either ignored altogether or overestimated. All terrorist actions are based on this effect. We are much more likely to be hit by a car when we go to work than to be hit by a subway explosion. But an explosion is an event that strongly affects emotions, and now we are already afraid to go to a concert, but we are not afraid to cross the road in the wrong place.

Another example: the population was warned of an impending hurricane, but most did nothing to prepare for it. A person who has never been in an emergency cannot imagine it, so they ignore its likelihood.

Survivor's mistake

If a person was able to survive in a catastrophe, then he will think that he survived because he did everything right, although hundreds of factors could have influenced his fate, and many people who acted the same way as himself died.

Denomination effect

We hardly spend a large amount of money on one purchase, but we easily reduce the same amount into several small ones. We just can't imagine that a lot of small bills add up to waste. This is one of the reasons why you need to keep a financial journal.

We think we know everything about everyone

The only person about whom you can say anything with certainty is you. But we live among people, so we need to somehow explain their actions. Therefore, we constantly ascribe our thoughts to other people and expect their own behavior from them.

Curse of knowledge

If a person is well versed in a certain topic, he thinks that others know as much. He is unable to look at the problem through the eyes of a poorly informed person. Therefore, some teachers know how to explain the topic, while others do not, someone writes excellent technical tasks, and someone is outraged that these performers again confused everything and did not understand anything.

The illusion of transparency

We overestimate our ability to understand other people and think that others know a lot about us. “Everyone is looking at me! They know for sure that I have not prepared well! The one that rubs his hands, I know for sure, he will fill me up now!"

Spotlight effect

We overestimate attention to our own person. Since we are always the most important to ourselves, it seems to us that other people constantly think about us or pay attention to our actions, as if we are actors in the light of a spotlight. In fact, others do not care about us, they are busy with themselves.

We believe that feelings don't change

We project all our knowledge and beliefs onto the past and into the future, as if everything that we know now was known before, and nothing will change over time.

Know-it-all effect

Every time we say “I knew it,” we are at the mercy of such an effect. It seems to us that everything that happened could have been predicted in advance. In fact, this became possible only now, when everything had already happened.

End of story effect

We know we have changed a lot. Each year added something to the experience, the events left a trace in the memory. But we are sure that this will not happen again in the future, and we will remain the same as now.

Deviation towards the result

We judge decisions not by how justified they were at the time of adoption, but by the results that these decisions led to.

Kolya and Vasya went to training, but Kolya is doing well, and Vasya dropped the kettlebell on his leg and now walks in a cast. Vasya thinks that training was a bad idea and he should have stayed at home.

Embellishing the past

We look at the past from the perspective of the present. And things that seemed bad, terrible, disgusting are no longer so terrible. "And I had this, and nothing, I live."

Reassessing impact

It seems to us that future events will change our life too much and cause a flood of emotions. We suffer especially badly before important stages: exams, interviews. A few days will pass, and no matter how we feared in advance, it will remain in the past.

Think of how your brain is deceiving itself and into a box. Perhaps next time you will be able to look at the situation from a different angle and unleash a creative potential that you yourself did not expect from yourself.

And we will talk about other types of cognitive biases.