My Review 5/5

Not available at library. So glad I picked this up on Amazon.
This book focuses on the advances in Cognitive Dissonance (CD) in the last 15 years.
CD is the engine of self-justification. CD is the meeting of two contrasting ideals. I.e. smoking is bad, I smoke, but it’s ok because I smoke to keep the weight off and being obese is bad.

CD also warps reality to self affirming views (see bias heuristics Thinking, Fast and Slow). Classic example Aesop’s fable the fox and the grapes. On not being able to reach the grapes alas the grapes are sour anyways. These biases/blind spots shape human interaction, and contrary to all the apologies to the contrary, lowered inhibition increases honest speaking. I.e. “I can’t believe I would have said that last night” while drinking in actually means “My personal bias/prejudice was exposed and I reject that”. This is classic CD and the brain covers up by blaming the substance.

CD is the brain-child of Leon Festinger. Consonant dissonance relationships are ones that are congruent with our currently held beliefs. The harder and more trials/tribulations a person’s WILLINGLY subjected themselves too the more they adhere to the belief. I.e. the young person who joins a Fraternity with a harsh hazing initiation will justify the hazing as part of inclusion.

CD is an evolutionary trait, imagine every good/bad decision playing out indefinitely in your mind. CD will, over time, blunt the mistakes and emphasize the ‘good’ of any situation (nostalgia). This allows people to buy a house in the suburbs over the trendy loft in the city and seek affirming evidence. “I always wanted a yard”.

CD can help explain human behavior that is not accounted for by behavioral or economic incentives. In addition to the smoker who continues to smoke in the face of fiscal cost of smoking, the social cost of being an outcast. Take the religious hospitals that close over the CD they experience when required to provide abortions. A rational agent economic model and social good model do not account for the hospital closing.

Good metaphor on pyramid of decision. At top easy to go one way or another. Until you slide to the bottom and you’ve internalized beliefs. Ask betters their confidence interval before and after placing bets on ponies and confidence increases nearly to certainty after finality of decision. Don’t just ask someone who has made the decision. Ask someone who is in the throes of evaluation.

Brain has evolved to have bias towards self. I.e. I’m a rational person. Therefor any idea I hold is rational. The other person with an opposing view is wrong, if only they would listen to me I could explain why. An individual has introspection to ‘back up’ a belief. No such mechanism exists for others. Take the stance “I know gun control to be effective because I’ve held that belief for years” and the comically opposite “They can’t be trusted to be objective because they’ve held their gun control belief for years”.

Brain is always categorizing things. Evolutionary trait that allowed early humans to quickly distinguish prey from predator, poison from nourishment. This same ‘category’ system is the precursor to prejudice (added book The nature of prejudice) which when cannot be corrected with evidence is the basis of bigotry. Categories is how our brain sorts ‘us’ and ‘them’. During times of plentiful ‘us’ and ‘them’ co-exists. During times of duress people retreat to ‘their’ respective groups. See internment of Japanese during WWII, or bullying of kids in other cliques.

The best way to make a friend. Have them do you a favor. Upon doing a favor for someone that person experience dissonance that they explain by saying “He’s a good guy”. I’m a rational person and would not do something nice for him unless he was deserving.

Book offers some interesting insight into history on the history and deregulation of pharmaceutical industry. How scientist used to receive funding from independent sources, but now pump out drugs that have dubious if questionable benefits. Why risk integrity and reputation? Because the scientist/politician has slid to the bottom of the pyramid and can see no wrong with the incremental changes he has internalized.

$10 word from the book: “confabulate” which is a memory disturbance, specifically recalling a memory without the intent to lie. Ego-centric mind will adjust memory in most flattering light. Memory is like a totalitarian dictator. Rejects things that don’t match. Adjust things that do to be self evident. Book goes on a binge of stories backing this claim. Authors of “Million Little Pieces” and “Fragments” guilty of a thousand narrative changes that ended with a novel and their downfall. See also Brian Williams and Hillary Clinton in their respective ‘duress under fire’ narratives.

From 5->4. First three chapters were phenomenal. After that it goes on a deep dive into real world examples. Again not a negative, but seemed diverge from the science of the brain to narration. I experienced dissonance as I felt the book would be more about the brain than application in the real world. Full chapter on expert confidence bias and how this leads police/prosecutors to imprison innocent people. How these ‘innocents’ tend to have less than stellar bios so it’s easy to justify ‘testi-lying’.

Surprise surprise, full chapter on how the brain adjust to divorce by rewriting memories. Book cites Dr. Gottman (see The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work: A Practical Guide from the Country’s Foremost Relationship Expert work). This book asserts that self justification starts couples down the path of contempt. Once memories are rewritten such that there is no happiness in the past, it’s easy to justify divorce.

The book ended on nice summary of keeping our watchful eye on our brains processes. Reminding readers to not second guess every decision, but to remember that admitting fault will garner the most sincerity in others.

Date Read

2016/01/18

Date Added

2016/05/31

Goodreads book information

Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts by Carol Tavris

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13421358

Bookshelves: personal-development, psychology

Author’s Note

Initial md Generated using https://github.com/jsr6720/goodreads-csv-to-md

Carol Tavris, Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts, Elliot Aronson, Marsha Mercant, Joe Barrett Audible 2010 (Audiobook)1

Significant revisions

tags: 2016, book, review, Tavris, personal-development, psychology

  • Apr 22nd, 2024 Converted to jekyll markdown format and copied to personal site
  • Jan 18th, 2016 Originally published on goodreads

EOF/Footnotes

  1. ISBN: =”” ↩