自我感覺良好 是每個人的本性
摘錄自：天下雜誌 經濟學人電子報 2014/3/14
2014-03-13Web only
作者：經濟學人
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| 圖片來源：flickr.com/photos/joshuacraig/ |
認為自己在大部分個人特質上優於一般同儕，即為平均水準以上效應（BTAE）。此效應的強度受許多因素影響，但無數研究皆顯示，在每個人身上，BTAE一直都存在。
這可以是好事；高估自身能力、個人特質和前景，有助克服障礙、勇於面對困難任務、提升自信。但那也可能是壞事；例如，懶惰或自私之人若低估這些問題，自然不會有改善它們的動力。
但一般來說，BTAE應該會自我限制；如果你那高人一等的想法實在太誇張，不但其他人不會相信，連你自己都不會相信。BTAE在心理學上廣受引用，但某人的特定特質是否真的優於平均，通常無法明確又客觀地衡量──說不定那真的是出於理性而非自我提升。
南安普頓大學、皇家哈洛威學院和俄亥俄大學的研究者，試圖以一群相當具有負面個人特質的受訪者，證實BTAE的存在：受刑人。他們訪問了85名南英格蘭的囚犯，其中至少2/3因搶劫或暴力犯罪入獄；受訪囚犯得評估自己與一般囚犯、一般非囚犯社群成員在9項特質上的優劣之分。
毫無意外，囚犯認為自己的各項特質都優於一般受刑人；他們認為自己更具道德、更有信用、更誠實、更可倚賴、更有同理心、更慷慨、更守法、更具自制力、更親切。重要的是，他們認為自己有8項特質優於非囚犯社群成員；唯一的例外為「守法」，不過，他們還是認為自己的守法程度合於平均。
對研究者來說，此結果顯示BTAE是自我提升而非理性的自我評估，其中最重要的就是，囚犯認定自己在守法和誠實這兩項特質上不輸一般社群成員（兩者間的重大差異，實際上已提供了客觀標準）。
不過，此研究還帶出了更大的問題。囚犯是在否認他們犯下的罪行？還是將罪行的嚴重性和非道德程度最小化？亦或是，他們完全誤解了「守法」的意義？無論如何，這項研究有助解釋，為何過去的研究顯示，囚犯總是低估自己出獄後再次犯罪的可能性；即使因違法而身處牢獄，在他們心中，他們已經是守法的公民了。（黃維德譯）
©The Economist
Newspaper Limited 2014
The Economist
Social psychology
Anything you
can do...
By The Economist
From The Economist
Published: March
13, 2014
Mar 11th 2014,
11:45 by P.H. | LAKE WOBEGON
…I CAN do better. Because Babbage is, well,
better than average. More moral, trustworthy, honest, dependable,
compassionate, generous, law-abiding, self-controlled and kinder to others. His
children are above average too, just like every child in Lake Wobegon (from
where he is writing this above-average article).
Call it the
better-than-average effect, or BTAE. The fact that people consistently judge
themselves superior to an average peer on most personality traits is one of the
cornerstones of social and personal psychology. The extent of the effect is
influenced by a number of factors (such as whether an individual is judging her
strengths or weaknesses, or comparing herself to a specific rather than average
peer), but numerous studies have shown the underlying BTAE to be highly
consistent.
This can be a good
thing. Overrating their abilities, personality traits and prospects can help
people overcome obstacles, persevere at difficult tasks and feel better about
themselves. It can also be a bad thing: those who are, say, lazy or selfish but
underestimate the extent of these problems will not be motivated to improve.
In general,
however, it has been assumed that the BTAE is self-limiting: if an individual's
claims of superiority are too outlandish, nobody will believe them—including
the individual themselves. Believing that I can do a little better than my
team's average of an eight-minute mile may motivate me to improve my time.
Believing that I can run twice as fast as the average is simply setting myself
up for failure. Reality can only be distorted so far before it snaps.
Although the BTAE
is widely cited in psychology literature, it is not usually measured against an
objective standard. So whether or not people actually are better than average
in terms of a particular trait cannot generally be judged unequivocally—perhaps
their claim actually is rational rather than self-enhancement? A new study
published in the British Journal of Social Psychology seeks to address this by
demonstrating the existence of the BTAE in a group of people whose personality
traits are too irrefutably negative to convincingly prove otherwise: convicted
prisoners.
Researchers from
the University of Southampton, the University of London's Royal Holloway
college, and Ohio University interviewed 85 prisoners at a jail in the south of
England, at least two-thirds of whom had been convicted of robberies or violent
crimes (some did not disclose their offence). All were asked to assess how they
compared with both the average fellow prisoner and the average member of the
(non-prison) community in terms of the nine traits listed above in the first
paragraph.
Unsurprisingly,
the prisoners rated themselves better than the average inmate on every trait:
they considered themselves more moral, trustworthy, honest, dependable,
compassionate, generous, law-abiding, self-controlled, and kinder to others.
Remarkably, they also rated themselves better than the average member of the
non-prison community on eight out of the nine traits. The exception was
"law-abidingness", where, although they did not rate themselves above
average, they rated themselves as equally law-abiding—perhaps the study's most
surprising finding, given that they were behind bars.
For the
researchers, the results offered evidence that the BTAE is measuring
self-enhancement rather than a rational (or even partly rational)
self-assessment, particularly given their findings on prisoners'
law-abidingness and honesty in comparison to the broader community (the stark
difference between the two communities effectively offers an objective
standard).
But the research
also raises broader questions. Are prisoners in denial about their crimes, or
do they minimize the severity or immorality of what they have done? Or is it
simply that they are unaware of the nature of their behaviour—that they simply
misunderstand the meaning of "law-abiding"? Regardless, the findings
offer some insight into why previous research has shown that prisoners
consistently underestimate the likelihood that they will offend again when
released; in their minds, they are already law-abiding citizens despite their
incarceration for precisely the opposite behaviour.
©The Economist
Newspaper Limited 2014
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