Lamba Shakti, Nityananda Vivek
Centre for Ecology and Conservation, College of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Exeter, Penryn Campus, Cornwall, United Kingdom; Department of Anthropology, University College London, London, United Kingdom.
Biological and Experimental Psychology, School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, Queen Mary University of London, London, United Kingdom; Institute of Neuroscience, Henry Wellcome Building for Neuroecology, Newcastle University, Framlington Place, Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom.
PLoS One. 2014 Aug 27;9(8):e104562. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0104562. eCollection 2014.
Self-deception is widespread in humans even though it can lead to disastrous consequences such as airplane crashes and financial meltdowns. Why is this potentially harmful trait so common? A controversial theory proposes that self-deception evolved to facilitate the deception of others. We test this hypothesis in the real world and find support for it: Overconfident individuals are overrated by observers and underconfident individuals are judged by observers to be worse than they actually are. Our findings suggest that people may not always reward the more accomplished individual but rather the more self-deceived. Moreover, if overconfident individuals are more likely to be risk-prone then by promoting them we may be creating institutions, including banks and armies, which are more vulnerable to risk. Our results reveal practical solutions for assessing individuals that circumvent the influence of self-deception and can be implemented in a range of organizations including educational institutions.
自我欺骗在人类中很普遍，尽管它可能会导致飞机坠毁和金融崩溃等灾难性后果。为什么这种潜在有害的特质如此常见？一种有争议的理论认为，自我欺骗的进化是为了便于欺骗他人。我们在现实世界中对这一假设进行了测试，并找到了支持证据：过度自信的个体被观察者高估，而缺乏自信的个体被观察者认为比实际情况更差。我们的研究结果表明，人们可能并不总是奖励更有成就的个体，而是奖励更善于自我欺骗的个体。此外，如果过度自信的个体更容易倾向于冒险，那么提拔他们可能会使包括银行和军队在内的机构更容易受到风险的影响。我们的结果揭示了评估个体的实际解决方案，这些方案可以规避自我欺骗的影响，并可在包括教育机构在内的一系列组织中实施。
