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By Root 1315 0

but, as political scientist Philip Tetlock shows in his book Expert Political Judgment: How Good Is It? How Can We Know?, even professional “experts” who are in the business of economic and political forecasting are usually no more accurate than us untrained folks—or than Mrs. Keech, for that matter.22 Hundreds of studies have shown that predictions based on an expert’s “personal experience” or “years of training” are rarely better than chance, in contrast to predictions based on actuarial data. But when experts are wrong, the centerpiece of their professional identity is threatened. Therefore, as dissonance theory would predict, the more self-confident and famous they are, the less likely they will be to admit mistakes. And that is just what Tetlock found. Experts reduce the dissonance caused by their failed forecasts by coming up with explanations of why they would have been right “if only”—if only that improbable calamity had not intervened; if only the timing of events had been different; if only blah blah blah.

Dissonance reduction operates like a thermostat, keeping our self-esteem bubbling along on high. That is why we are usually oblivious to the self-justifications, the little lies to ourselves that prevent us from even acknowledging that we made mistakes or foolish decisions. But dissonance theory applies to people with low self-esteem, too, to people who consider themselves to be schnooks, crooks, or incompetents. They are not surprised when their behavior confirms their negative self-image. When they make a wrongheaded prediction or go through a severe initiation to get into a dull group, they merely say, “Yup, I screwed up again; that’s just like me.” A used-car salesman who knows that he is dishonest does not feel dissonance when he conceals the dismal repair record of the car he is trying to unload; a woman who believes she is unlovable does not feel dissonance when men reject her; a con man does not experience dissonance when he cheats an old man out of his life’s savings.

Our convictions about who we are carry us through the day, and we are constantly interpreting the things that happen to us through the filter of those core beliefs. When they are violated, even by a good experience, it causes us discomfort. An appreciation of the power of self-justification helps us understand, therefore, why people who have low self-esteem, or who simply believe that they are incompetent in some domain, are not totally overjoyed when they do something well; why, on the contrary, they often feel like frauds. If the woman who believes she is unlovable meets a terrific guy who starts pursuing her seriously, she will feel momentarily pleased, but that pleasure is likely to be tarnished by a rush of dissonance: “What does he see in me?” Her resolution is unlikely to be “How nice; I must be more appealing than I thought I was.” More likely, it will be “As soon as he discovers the real me, he’ll dump me.” She will pay a high psychological price to have that consonance restored.

Indeed, several experiments find that most people who have low self-esteem or a low estimate of their abilities do feel uncomfortable with their dissonant successes and dismiss them as accidents or anomalies.23 This is why they seem so stubborn to friends and family members who try to cheer them up. “Look, you just won the Pulitzer Prize for literature! Doesn’t that mean you’re good?” “Yeah, it’s nice, but just a fluke. I’ll never be able to write another word, you’ll see.” Self-justification, therefore, is not only about protecting high self-esteem; it’s also about protecting low self-esteem if that is how a person sees himself.

The Pyramid of Choice

Imagine two young men who are identical in terms of attitudes, abilities, and psychological health. They are reasonably honest and have the same middling attitude toward, say, cheating: They think it is not a good thing to do, but there are worse crimes in the world. Now they are both in the midst of taking an exam that will determine whether they will get into graduate school. They each draw