I recently came upon the study done by David Dunning and Justin Kruger in 1999, which describes a bias that people may have, that makes them overestimate or underestimate their competence at a certain task.
A person who has little knowledge in a particular field may tend to overestimate their competence or skill level in that field.
While on the opposite side, a person who has a fair amount of knowledge in a particular field may tend to underestimate their competence in that field.
Now, I am sure I have seen multiple examples in my life where this study seems to hold true. So must have you.
Sometime back I took an Uber. The driver was a middle aged fellow, who looked like he had a lot of experience in cab business. But this guy drove rashly. I literally held on to the roof handle in the back seat the whole ride, fearing for my life, dreading that this guy would crash the car as soon as his luck runs out. I did try to persuade him to drive sanely, but to no avail. He mentioned something about him being the best driver in his driver friends group. When I heard his claim, the first thing that came to mind was that he must be delusional. At least his Uber rating did not seem to concur with his view of himself. I guess, that was Dunning-Kruger effect at play.
So this study seems to be intuitive and does seem to stand with some events I have experienced or some people I have met. And to take it further, we may say that someone suffering from such a cognitive bias, will tend to screw up the task at hand most of the times.
Take the example of Indian Movies. There are some masterpieces made in Indian film industry that have gained the cult status of being called torture movies.
When you think of Torture movies, the first guy that comes to mind is Sajid Khan. This guy has such gems as Humshakals and Himmatwala to boast of. The situation here surely reeks of Dunning-Kruger effect.
Dunning-Kruger effect is evident in workplaces too. Especially in software industry here in India. I have seen plenty of technical leaders get into project management. There is some sort of unspoken code here in Indian SW Industry that to be successful, this is the path one must take.
And given the herd mentality that most Indians live by, it's not surprising that most of the technical guys do take the next logical step and become project managers.
Now some of these guys have no clue. They come into project management with confidence gained by working on the technical stuff for more than 8 to 10 years. But being good at technical stuff, doesn't naturally translate into being good at managing a team of humans and getting the best out of them, while still keeping them happy and productive over the long run.
Hence they end up making life miserable for their team. This is certainly not true for everyone out there, but its applicable on a large enough percentage that it deserves a mention here.
Well there must be more examples out there. Will write about them when they come to my mind.
What other examples of Dunning-Kruger effect do you see in real life? Do share in the comments. Thanks.
A person who has little knowledge in a particular field may tend to overestimate their competence or skill level in that field.
While on the opposite side, a person who has a fair amount of knowledge in a particular field may tend to underestimate their competence in that field.
Now, I am sure I have seen multiple examples in my life where this study seems to hold true. So must have you.
Sometime back I took an Uber. The driver was a middle aged fellow, who looked like he had a lot of experience in cab business. But this guy drove rashly. I literally held on to the roof handle in the back seat the whole ride, fearing for my life, dreading that this guy would crash the car as soon as his luck runs out. I did try to persuade him to drive sanely, but to no avail. He mentioned something about him being the best driver in his driver friends group. When I heard his claim, the first thing that came to mind was that he must be delusional. At least his Uber rating did not seem to concur with his view of himself. I guess, that was Dunning-Kruger effect at play.
So this study seems to be intuitive and does seem to stand with some events I have experienced or some people I have met. And to take it further, we may say that someone suffering from such a cognitive bias, will tend to screw up the task at hand most of the times.
Take the example of Indian Movies. There are some masterpieces made in Indian film industry that have gained the cult status of being called torture movies.
A Torture movie is a movie that you would show a suspect to make him confess to his crime. In Indian Jokelore, a torture movie is employed by the police when even the third degree torture fails to get any information or confession from the suspect.
When you think of Torture movies, the first guy that comes to mind is Sajid Khan. This guy has such gems as Humshakals and Himmatwala to boast of. The situation here surely reeks of Dunning-Kruger effect.
Dunning-Kruger effect is evident in workplaces too. Especially in software industry here in India. I have seen plenty of technical leaders get into project management. There is some sort of unspoken code here in Indian SW Industry that to be successful, this is the path one must take.
And given the herd mentality that most Indians live by, it's not surprising that most of the technical guys do take the next logical step and become project managers.
Now some of these guys have no clue. They come into project management with confidence gained by working on the technical stuff for more than 8 to 10 years. But being good at technical stuff, doesn't naturally translate into being good at managing a team of humans and getting the best out of them, while still keeping them happy and productive over the long run.
Hence they end up making life miserable for their team. This is certainly not true for everyone out there, but its applicable on a large enough percentage that it deserves a mention here.
Well there must be more examples out there. Will write about them when they come to my mind.
What other examples of Dunning-Kruger effect do you see in real life? Do share in the comments. Thanks.
No comments:
Post a Comment