Are People Excessive or Judicious in Their Egocentrism? A Modeling Approach to Understanding Bias and Accuracy in People's Optimism

Paul D Windschitl; Jason P Rose; Michael T Stalkfleet; Andrew R Smith

doi:10.1037/0022-3514.95.2.253

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Are People Excessive or Judicious in Their Egocentrism? A Modeling Approach to Understanding Bias and Accuracy in People's Optimism

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Are People Excessive or Judicious in Their Egocentrism? A Modeling Approach to Understanding Bias and Accuracy in People's Optimism

Paul D Windschitl, Jason P Rose, Michael T Stalkfleet and Andrew R Smith

Journal of personality and social psychology, Vol.95(2), pp.253-273

08/2008

DOI: 10.1037/0022-3514.95.2.253

PMID: 18665701

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Abstract

People are often egocentric when judging their likelihood of success in competitions, leading to overoptimism about winning when circumstances are generally easy and to overpessimism when the circumstances are difficult. Yet, egocentrism might be grounded in a rational tendency to favor highly reliable information (about the self) more so than less reliable information (about others). A general theory of probability called extended support theory was used to conceptualize and assess the role of egocentrism and its consequences for the accuracy of people's optimism in 3 competitions (Studies 1-3, respectively). Also, instructions were manipulated to test whether people who were urged to avoid egocentrism would show improved or worsened accuracy in their likelihood judgments. Egocentrism was found to have a potentially helpful effect on one form of accuracy, but people generally showed too much egocentrism. Debias instructions improved one form of accuracy but had no impact on another. The advantages of using the EST framework for studying optimism and other types of judgments (e.g., comparative ability judgments) are discussed.

likelihood judgment

comparative judgment

egocentrism

optimism

shared-circumstance effect

Details

Title: Subtitle: Are People Excessive or Judicious in Their Egocentrism? A Modeling Approach to Understanding Bias and Accuracy in People's Optimism
Creators: Paul D Windschitl - Department of Psychology, University of Iowa
Jason P Rose - Department of Psychology, University of Iowa
Michael T Stalkfleet - Department of Psychology, University of Iowa
Andrew R Smith - Department of Psychology, University of Iowa
Resource Type: Journal article
Publication Details: Journal of personality and social psychology, Vol.95(2), pp.253-273
DOI: 10.1037/0022-3514.95.2.253
PMID: 18665701
NLM abbreviation: J Pers Soc Psychol
ISSN: 0022-3514
eISSN: 1939-1315
Publisher: American Psychological Association
Grant note: name: National Science Foundation, award: SES 03-19243; SES 07-20349
Language: English
Date published: 08/2008
Academic Unit: Psychological and Brain Sciences
Record Identifier: 9984213397902771

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