Illusory superiority
As you might expect, however, the devil is in
the detail. Psychologists have demonstrated
again and again that the way we see ourselves
is modulated by a smorgasbord of cognitive
biases that serve to make us all, to a greater
or lesser extent, deluded about who we are.
“Our self-perceptions are far from perfectly
accurate,” says Vazire.
We tend to be most deluded when it
comes to personality traits we consider
highly desirable or undesirable. “We
overestimate ourselves on the traits that
are important to us, and traits that are
ambiguous too,” says David Dunning at
Cornell University in New York. That can
manifest as “illusory superiority”, where
people overestimate their qualities and rate
themselves more favourably than others do.
For example, Vazire found that students’ self-
reports of intelligence were generally inflated
compared with results from IQ tests and other
people’s perceptions. Whether we are deluding
ourselves about our smarts, our physical
attractiveness or our charisma, we seem
to do it to enhance our sense of self-worth
and social status. I fear I may have fallen into
this trap when rating myself as 96 in “open-
mindedness”, while several others rated
me in the low 70s. One so-called mate even
Friends may be less
biased in their opinion
of you than your
family members
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