You know those visual illusions, the one where you see a stairway with
three or four step "going up" or a three dimensional box pointing out
towards you? In each of those illusions if someone points out that if
you concentrate you can see the stairway upside down and the box
inverted. But we have a bias of persistent illusion, once we stop
concentrating the image pops back to the original shape. Many
instincts and biases are like this and being paranoid or paying
attention to unlikely but persistent predictions and forcasts is one
of them.
Example
A new theory of cognitive biases, called error management theory
(EMT), proposes that psychological mechanisms are designed to be
predictably biased when the costs of false-positive and false-negative
errors were asymmetrical over evolutionary history. This theory
explains known phenomena such as men's overperception of women's
sexual intent, and it predicts new biases in social inference such as
women's underestimation of men's commitment.
Buss comments on Error Management Theory. In an uncertain world, two
potential errors in thinking: a. partner having affair (but isn't) b.
partner isn't having affair (but is) The cost of making those two
errors are very different. Those making the first error have less cost
(from a reproductive success standpoint) than those who make the
second. Theoretically we evolved toward vigilance and are more likely
to make adaptive error. Explains why men and women sometimes have
delusions that a partner is unfaithful or might be. "It's not paranoia
if they're really out to get you!"
http://www.psychologicalscience.org/media/releases/2002/pr020103.cfm
A new theory of cognitive biases, called error management theory
(EMT), proposes that psychological mechanisms are designed to be
predictably biased when the costs of false-positive and false-negative
errors were asymmetrical over evolutionary history. This theory
explains known phenomena such as men's overperception of women's
sexual intent, and it predicts new biases in social inference such as
women's underestimation of men's commitment.
Buss comments on Error Management Theory. In an uncertain world, two
potential errors in thinking: a. partner having affair (but isn't) b.
partner isn't having affair (but is) The cost of making those two
errors are very different. Those making the first error have less cost
(from a reproductive success standpoint) than those who make the
second. Theoretically we evolved toward vigilance and are more likely
to make adaptive error. Explains why men and women sometimes have
delusions that a partner is unfaithful or might be. "It's not paranoia
if they're really out to get you!"
http://www.psychologicalscience.org/media/releases/2002/pr020103.cfm
