The Hallmark of Intelligence (original) (raw)
Related papers
Why the unskilled are unaware: Further explorations of (absent) self-insight among the incompetent
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 2008
People are typically overly optimistic when evaluating the quality of their performance on social and intellectual tasks. In particular, poor performers grossly overestimate their performances because their incompetence deprives them of the skills needed to recognize their deficits. Five studies demonstrated that poor performers lack insight into their shortcomings even in real world settings and when given incentives to be accurate. An additional meta-analysis showed that it was lack of insight into their own errors (and not mistaken assessments of their peers) that led to overly optimistic estimates among poor performers. Along the way, these studies ruled out recent alternative accounts that have been proposed to explain why poor performers hold such positive impressions of their performance.
Is an Unskilled Really Unaware of it?
Two psychologists, Justin KRUGER from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, Illinois and David DUNNING from Cornell University, published their study named "Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments" in 1999 (Kruger & Dunning). The summary of their work concludes that “...incompetent individuals have more difficulty recognizing their true level of ability than do more competent individuals and that a lack of metacognitive skills may underlie this deficiency” (Kruger & Dunning, 1999.pg. 31). Many studies which have followed Kruger and Dunning, including their own follow-up studies, have looked at students’self-assessment toward their own tests or learning abilities. A few studies have adopted this study to different fields such as consumer product choice (Burson, 2004) and economic agents and decision errors (Ferraro, 2010). Although the educational perspective was exploredin the original study, the leadership in an educational setting was not investigated. The current study focuses on a review of relevant literature regarding Kruger and Dunning’s work, in addition to applying their theory via a case study of a specific leadership position in an institution of higher education.
Are the unskilled really that unaware? An alternative explanation
2008
In a series of articles and manuscripts (eg,[Kruger, J., & Dunning, D.(1999). Unskilled and unaware of it: How difficulties in recognizing one's own incompetence lead to inflated self-assessment. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 77, 1121–1134; Dunning, D., Johnson, K., Ehrlinger, J., & Kruger, J.(2003). Why people fail to recognize their own incompetence. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 12, 83–87; Ehrlinger, J., Johnson, K., Banner, M., Kruger, J., & Dunning, D.(2008).
Psihološka obzorja / Horizons of Psychology, 2018
Realistic perception of our own knowledge is important in various areas of everyday life, yet previous studies reveal that our self-perception is full of shortcomings. The present study focused on general overestimation of knowledge and differences between experts and the less-skilled (The Dunning-Kruger effect), self-perceived knowledge of non-existing concepts (overclaiming), and the illusion of knowledge. These phenomena were tested with an instrument which measured the actual knowledge of different domains (grammar, literature, and nanotechnology), as well as self-assessed knowledge. Results showed that, on average, participants overestimated their absolute performance, but not their performance relative to others. Furthermore, the bottom quartile overestimated their absolute and their relative performance most, while the top quartile perceived their absolute performance most accurately and substantially underestimated their relative performance. Results related to overclaiming showed that 56% of respondents claimed knowledge of at least one non-existent book and that the extent of overclaiming was substantially correlated with self-perceived expertise. Lastly, results showed that an increased quantity of information about nanotechnology led to a false certainty in answering questions from this area.
A rational model of the Dunning–Kruger effect supports insensitivity to evidence in low performers
Nature Human Behaviour
I n copious work studying adult metacognition, participants appear to be miscalibrated in their ability to judge their own performance across a large variety of domains 1-3. Although there are age-related improvements in metacognitive abilities whereby very young children overestimate their competence a great deal more than adults 4 , as well as differences by domain 5,6 , on most tasks, researchers find that accuracy is low when making judgments about one's performance, when estimating either one's score or standing relative to others 3. There have been studies of specific domains such as weather forecasting 5 and particular ways of eliciting judgments 7 where participants do show much better calibration to their own abilities, but, in most settings, accuracy is typically limited. In an influential paper, Kruger and Dunning conducted a series of studies that suggested that poorer performers tended to be less well calibrated in their ability to judge their performance after completing a task than higher performers 8. They construed poor perceived performance by the lowest-scoring individuals as a metacognitive deficit: the worst performers lacked the skills needed to correctly do the task and also to judge their performance on the task. Commonly known as the Dunning-Kruger effect, this theory continues to be featured regularly in the media 9 , particularly for the purpose of rationalizing others' seemingly irrational behavior (for example, anti-vaxxers 10 and government officials 11). Although discussions of the overconfidence of poor performers have focused on the idea that these people are less sensitive to their own errors, thinking about self-assessment from the perspective of a rational agent potentially offers a different account. If we imagine individuals as naive statisticians analyzing their own behavior, the rational Bayesian solution is to combine the evidence from experience with one's prior beliefs. If those prior beliefs are that one will perform relatively well, this should lead to poor performers overestimating their ability and good performers underestimating their ability to at least some extent 12. This alternative explanation engages with a different point than previous controversy over the Dunning-Kruger effect. Krueger