EPTAbove Average? - Page 2
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Spiffeh
United States830 Posts
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Xiron
Germany1233 Posts
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7mk
Germany10156 Posts
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niteReloaded
Croatia5281 Posts
Everyone IS above average, in the part of life they find interesting (which almost always matches where their talents lie). You can be faster than me, but since I don't give a fuck about running, I'll keep thinking to myself that I'm above average when it comes to playing guitar or w/e. And you're an above average runner. And we're both right. The problem arises tho when we're focusing on our own advantages in situations where those qualities are not the main thing. For example, if a great runner and a great guitar player worked at a law firm, none of these attributes really dictate how useful we are at that specific workplace. You're right in this regard. | ||
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ReketSomething
United States6012 Posts
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Wrongspeedy
United States1655 Posts
On April 20 2012 01:31 thedeadhaji wrote: <p>Are you above average? </p><p>If you're like most, then you probably thought something along the lines of, *"well, I'm not spectacular per se, but I can hold my own. I'd say I'm slightly above average." For some of us, it may very well be the case that we are above average; but it's quite likely that we're overestimating ourselves [1]. </p><p>One prominent example is in online dating. Studies have shown that over 70% of us rate ourselves <em>above average</em> in looks in such settings [2]. A separate study using the site "Hot or Not", determined that our own self-assessment was significantly higher than what our peers would rate us [3].</p><p>So psychological studies consistently show our propensity to overvalue ourselves. But honestly, a study done by an anonymous researcher in some ivory tower may not be convincing to many of us; we surely have the right to remain skeptical. But let's look at our everyday, normal lives for a bit. Haven't we sesn first hand, this kind of self-overvaling behavior? </p><p>Let's move the setting to the office, the site of our daily toils. Now, think about some of our coworkers, both current and former. Let's think about the passing comments they made about how unappreciated they are, their gripes about being passed by for a promotion in favor of another coworker, or their self-promotions about how hard and how long they worked. What did we feel when we heard these comments? Did we agree? Did we smirk? Did we empathize? For some, the unhappiness was probably justified; there are plenty of brilliant people who go unnoticed or unappreciated. But looking back at our experiences, was <em>everyone</em> assess themselves accurately? How many people made us think, *"I can understand where he's coming from, but I honestly can't agree." ?</p><p>What is the barometer to judge these people's self-assessment? The equivalent of the "Hot or Not" test, cited earlier, is the simple converstaions we have with other coworkers each day. Taken in aggregate, our peers have a much more balanced perspective for our true abilities and results. In such an office poll, we quickly find out that there are indeed discrepancies between self-assessed values and the common opinion. The guy who was passed over for a promotion lost out to someone who delivered more results than he; the guy who asserts that he works extremely hard actually works significantly fewer hours than the engineers across the office who put in 12+ hour days every day, plus weekends.</p><p>Most people are firmly entrenched in the idea that they are above average. What is the root of this behavior? Is it the incomplete dataset we operate off of [4]? Is it a self-defense mechanism? </p><p>Whatever the root cause may be, self-awareness of the matter is essential; not only to avoid being labeled by our peers as a self-overvalueer (which sooner or later devolves into mockery), but to be able to see ourselves clearly -- to take steps in becoming truly <em>above average</em> [5].</p><p><hr>[1] Of course, the area in which we consider ourselves to be <em>above average</em> will differ from person to person when the question is posed so vaguely, so it may very well be that we've all subconsciously chosen a biased area from which to base our above-averageness on. </p><p>[2] I believe one of the authors of the study was Ariely. The number of users who rated themselves <em>below average</em> in looks was eitehr 2% or 12%, a paltry sum.</p><p>[3] So if we rated oureslves a 7/10 on an online dating site, then we're probably closer to a 5 or 6 when judged by our peers/mates. Of course, it's possible that those judging us have an upwardly skewed perspective as well, distorting the results. </p><p>[4] After all, we have the most data about ourselves. </p><p>[5] If so desired.</p> Crossposted from my main blog I love your blogs <3 To understand yourself is to understand your relationship with the world around you. Its really hard to be introspective and really find out the truth about yourself. But if you go out and explore the world and other peoples opinions it becomes much easier to learn about yourself. Something I've learned from Jiddu.K and been struggling to implement in my own life recently. It is possible that we have the most information about ourselves, but there is no simple mirror to your soul, the only mirror we have to learn about ourselves is others. | ||
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Gummy
United States2180 Posts
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Drowsy
United States4876 Posts
On April 20 2012 01:31 thedeadhaji wrote: </p><p>One prominent example is in online dating. Studies have shown that over 70% of us rate ourselves <em>above average</em> in looks in such settings [2]. I bet my god damn dick that the way this actually breaks down is that 85% of females on online dating sites believe themselves to be better than average looking and more like 55% of dudes believe themselves to be above average looking. But I remember an OKCupid study that revealed that the females on the site rated 80% of males as below average looking which is obviously impossible. The males rated females in an almost perfect normal distribution. On April 20 2012 02:02 Subversive wrote: Reminds me of a study of university students. They divided them into 4 groups, asked them individually how they expected to do in a test that would be administered and then correlated the results against the expectation. The bottom quartile were the least accurate in their self-assessment. The next worst was the second bottom. The third was close, but still over-rated their abilities substanitally. The only group who evaluated themselves as likely to score lower than they did, was the top 25%. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning–Kruger_effect Paradoxically its probable that most people who have any awareness of this are more likely to be in the minority who are underrating themselves. Also accoridng to the wikipedia entry the opposite of the Dunning-Kruger effect is observed in East Asian countries. I don't think its human nature, there's something culturally at work in the west and America specifically. | ||
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tube
United States1475 Posts
different people take up different hobbies, and the amount of time they spend on that hobby is relatively higher than most others, which leads to similarly increased skill level in whatever that is which may convince people to generally say they are above average | ||
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docvoc
United States5491 Posts
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Hnnngg
United States1101 Posts
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Merany
France890 Posts
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Scarecrow
Korea (South)9172 Posts
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Loser777
1931 Posts
On traits that can be more systematically measured, such as test scores, grades, etc., but even those don't say much about people. I don't have a problem with people overvaluing themselves, as it probably helps most people stay sane and in the end people don't really care what your opinion of yourself is--they're perfectly capable of judging you on their own. | ||
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Jerubaal
United States7684 Posts
This is the best blog I've read of yours. I find most of your blogs pedantic, overly florid and full of modern social science horseshit. In the future, I'd recommend either drawing on some concrete fact and extrapolating on it, like you did here, or discussing in depth why you believe one particular idea. That's much better than just stringing together a bunch of dubious claims. Cheers! | ||
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Tobberoth
Sweden6375 Posts
 Platinum player in SC2. 1.4 on the swedish highschool test (1.0 is the average, 2.0 is the max).I think it all depends on the situation. As for looks, I really have no idea, it's insanely subjective. While I might score below average on a swedish dating site, I would probably score way above the average on an asian dating site, maybe solely because I'm white and tall, but still, it's all about perspective. | ||
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FlamingForce
Netherlands701 Posts
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Umpteen
United Kingdom1570 Posts
On April 20 2012 06:37 Drowsy wrote: But I remember an OKCupid study that revealed that the females on the site rated 80% of males as below average looking which is obviously impossible. Perfectly possible, if the males on the site were an unrepresentative sample of all males. Given that this is a dating site, do you think the average attractiveness of members is likely to be higher or lower than the average in the general population? EDIT: In fact, we don't even need to resort to that explanation. When a girl rates a guy's attractiveness, she isn't factoring in all the other guys she's ever seen. I mean, if you showed her 50 complete munters in a row, she wouldn't progressively lower her estimation of what 'averagely attractive' was, would she? No: what she does probably weighted strongly towards using the extremes of attractiveness to which she has previously been exposed to define a midpoint. And because everyone has seen at least a couple of highly attractive models and movie stars, that drags the calculated midpoint a long way from true average. When you watch a lot of telly, everyone around you looks less attractive than you would otherwise find them. | ||
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lolmlg
619 Posts
A separate study using the site "Hot or Not", determined that our own self-assessment was significantly higher than what our peers would rate us This is a significantly error-prone way of testing such a thing. There's extreme skew on Hototnot that divides males and females, people who show cleavage and people who don't, etc. | ||
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lolmlg
619 Posts
On April 20 2012 20:09 Umpteen wrote: Perfectly possible, if the males on the site were an unrepresentative sample of all males. Given that this is a dating site, do you think the average attractiveness of members is likely to be higher or lower than the average in the general population? EDIT: In fact, we don't even need to resort to that explanation. When a girl rates a guy's attractiveness, she isn't factoring in all the other guys she's ever seen. I mean, if you showed her 50 complete munters in a row, she wouldn't progressively lower her estimation of what 'averagely attractive' was, would she? No: what she does probably weighted strongly towards using the extremes of attractiveness to which she has previously been exposed to define a midpoint. And because everyone has seen at least a couple of highly attractive models and movie stars, that drags the calculated midpoint a long way from true average. When you watch a lot of telly, everyone around you looks less attractive than you would otherwise find them. Try going on a site like that and comparing the scores men get to the scores women get. They're drastically different. And since you can't be sure that all or even most of the votes come from people of the opposite gender, it's not as easy as saying that men and women vote differently. Hotornot in particular used to try to force you to vote on pictures of both sexes. | ||
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