Point
It became clear how humans react to new information.In fact, our first reaction to new information is instinctivelydetermined, and we all react the same way.The answer is as follows.
- Without time to think, people blindly believe in the information theyreceive.
- On the other hand, if you have time to think about the information youhave obtained, you can more correctly judge its truth orfalsehood.
Tips for practicing this technique
- If you want to control the other person, it's important to give themas little time as possible to think.
- If you don't want to be controlled by the other person, it's importantto set aside time to think.
- If the other person is rushing to judgment on you, be careful becausehe or she may be trying to control you.
The habit of blindly believing new information the moment we perceiveit also leads to the following biasesThe first step to avoiding bias is to know what bias you're proneto.You should be aware of these biases.
- Corresponding bias
People tend to assume that their behavior reflects their personality. - Truthfulness bias
People have a tendency to assume that the other person is telling thetruth. - The persuasion effect
People are more likely to feel more persuaded by what is said when itis spoken when they are distracted. - Denial-innuendo effect
When denied, people tend to stick to what is denied. - Hypothesis testing bias
When testing a hypothesis, people tend to ignore inconvenient factsand look only for facts that are convenient for proving thehypothesis. - The case where humans can scrutinize information instantly (i.e., whenthey can detect a falsehood even if they haven't had time to thinkabout it)
Those who were distracted would not have time to process theadditional fact that the statement written in red is not true, so thefalsehood would be reflected in the ruling as fact - The case where humans can't scrutinize information instantly (i.e., ifthey don't have time to think about it and can't see through thefalsehoods)
Since participants do not need time to decide whether to believe theerroneous statement, there is no point in distraction and the rulingwill not make a difference. - The distracted group increased the perpetrator's incarceration fromsix years, about twice as long, to 11 years.
- Undistracted groups were able to ignore false statements.As a result,the false information in the statement did not make a difference inthe sentence for the period of incarceration.
Introduction of the research
| Research Institute | University of Texas |
|---|---|
| Year the study was published | 1993 |
| Quote Source | Gilbert et al., 1993 |
Research Method
The study looked at how humans react to information they know for thefirst time.Specifically, it was investigated whether or not human beings caninstantly judge the authenticity of information that they know for thefirst time or not.
In the study, 71 participants read statements about 2 types ofrobberies. And the researchers asked them to judge how many years therobber should be sentenced to imprisonment.One statement stated thatthe robber had a gun in order to give the subjects a bad impression ofthe robber.The other statement stated that the robbers were feedingthe children, making the subject think that the robbers were not soserious.And subjects were informed that the statements were a mix offacts and fiction, with all correct explanations in green andincorrect explanations in red.The researchers also divided thesubjects into two groups so that one group was distracted whilereading the false statement.In other words, one group was deprived ofthe time to judge the truth or falsity of the information.The expectedresult is one of the following.
Research Result
Here are the results of making a robbery look more ferocious with afalse statement:
This suggests that people can detect falsehood only if they have timeto think about perceived information.On the other hand, if you don't have time to think, you believe whatyou perceive, as it is.
In other words, to perceive information means to believe it.So unlessyou think critically about the information you perceive, you willcontinue to believe it.
My view on this research
We can get the information by any means such as word-of-mouth, TV,internet and so on.Most of these information are useful, but some ofthese are false.Based on the results of this experiment, weunconsciously trust such false information.However, if you check allthe information to see if it's true or not, you won't be able toachieve anything and you might miss a great opportunity.Therefore, weneed to understand what traits and biases human beings have so that wecan effectively notice them when we fall into those biases.In thisblog, I will continue to introduce the characteristics and biases ofhuman beings from scientific papers, so I hope you find it useful fromthis perspective as well.