We have all been there, trapped in a debate with someone who is sure of themselves, even when they are completely mistaken. They speak with the expertise of a specialist, the confidence of a theoretician, and the actual knowledge of a partially-cooked Wikipedia page.
You see them on the web, too, the self-anointed “truth-tellers” of the web, just waiting to correct scientists, doctors, and anyone daring enough to disagree.
Whether it’s a family member describing how vaccines are distributed or a stranger on Facebook declaring them a geopolitics expert after seeing a 10-minute YouTube video, the trend is ubiquitous. And frustratingly enough, science says this behavior makes perfect sense.
The Study That Explained It All
In 1999, Cornell University psychologists David Dunning and Justin Kruger released a landmark study that assigned a name to this scratching-the-head phenomenon.
Their study showed that less competent or less educated individuals in a specific domain are the ones who are least hesitant when it comes to exhibiting their knowledge or skills.
People were given a standardized humour, grammar, and logic test, then interviewed on how accurately they believed they had answered it.
The results were a surprise: the worst-performing subjects were also the subjects who thought they had had the best performance. Indeed, students at the lower 12th percentile believed they were at the 62nd percentile, a massive overestimate of talent.
This, Dunning and Kruger concluded, wasn’t arrogance. This was a lack of self-knowledge, what psychologists refer to as a lack of metacognition, or the capacity for a person to assess, objectively, their knowledge and talents.
That is: some people are so wrong that they don’t have a sense of how wrong they are.
The Confidence Illusion
This “illusion of competence” isn’t limited, either, to examination halls or classrooms. It is performed out there, throughout workplaces, social cliques, and, naturally, the contentious world of online debate.
Many confuse confidence with competence. We are predisposed to believe what people who talk loudly, despite what little sense they make, have to say. That’s how loud, vociferous voices dominate the conversation and sometimes even the top jobs.
“Fake it till you make it” may hold for a minority of cases, but the Dunning-Kruger effect shows that many of us are at the level of “fake it” but believe that we have indeed made it.
Meanwhile, the Truly Skilled Doubt Themselves
Incidentally, what is also true is that highly qualified individuals are likely to underrate their own performance, a condition known as impostor syndrome.
Differing from the innocently clueless, such people are aware enough of how much there is left for them to learn. Their self-knowledge, despite being correct, sometimes betrays them, causing them to continue doubts about themselves and a sense of lack.
So, whereas the less educated overestimate, the educated tend to undersell their knowledge. The consequence? The world finds itself with much noise based on overconfidence and not enough thoughtful voices breaking through it.
Overconfidence in Everyday Life
Just flip a page or click a button, and you’ll see this dynamic in action. From experts being interrupted at conferences to politicians spewing mumbo-jumbo with absolute confidence, overconfidence manages to command attention.
And while it is simple enough to roll one’s eyes and turn a blind eye, the effects go beyond disgust. The arrogance of the uninformed can create public opinion, spread misinformation, and even influence high-level policy decisions.
Why We Fall for It
Some of the issues are the nature of our own brains. Confidence is convincing; it projects power. Even when a person is utterly incorrect, their confidence causes people to rethink what they thought they knew.
It’s a psychological trap that humans have been falling into for centuries. That’s why smooth talkers often get ahead, while cautious thinkers second-guess themselves into silence.
A Little Humility Goes a Long Way
As Dunning himself proceeded to note, “The first rule of the Dunning-Kruger club is you don’t know you’re in it.”
Knowing one’s own limitations is not weakness, but wisdom. A readiness for correction, challenging assumptions, and curiosity are signs of intelligence, not insecurity.
Some of the brightest intellects are also the least vocal ones in a room, likely too busy studying how to yell.
Deeper Lesson
It is easy to mock the obtusely confident, and frankly, sometimes it is deserved. There is a deeper lesson, however. We live in a world where, much of the time, brazenness is held in greater esteem than truth, self-assurance than self-examination.
Maybe it is time that people learned to appreciate the opposite. Because at the end of the day, acting like you know all there is promises to make you a center of attention, but acknowledging how much you don’t know may make you wise.
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