Alone in a Crowd of Sheep

[luke wilson]

Just read this interesting paper,

_file:///C:/Users/Martin/Downloads/Alone%20in%20a%20Crowd%20of%20Sheep%20(1).pdf

It is easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson, Essays

I think this phenomena (alone in a crowd of sheep) is quite intuitive as opposed to other psychological phenomena on this board. In this they demonstrate that everyone thinks they are unique but think others are conformists, thus they see themselves as "Alone in a crowd of sheep". By everyone, I mean, uhmm, the grad students who took the studies who supposedly represent the whole western culture. But hey, these is how most studies are done!

The gist of the study is that, when considering their own motives/actions, someone will give their internal thoughts (introspection) more value in terms of attributing meaning to their actions. However, they don't give other people the same privilege. So when it comes to conformity, the assessment of 'conformist' isn't reached by the actor but rather by an external observer as the actor values the introspection more than the action - when it comes to themselves, and obviously, everyone denies being a conformist relative to others. When it comes to other peoples behaviour/actions, the person will see the conformity and won't put to much weight on any sort of internal 'independent' processes in the other's part. So essentially, others are sheep, but you are not because you judge them on behaviour but judge yourself on thoughts (introspection) and neglect your behaviour. After all, conformity is an action, not a thought, yet somehow people will deny this in themselves even though their behaviour aligns with the definition.

In the study, the discrepency between how we see ourselves vs others in this regard is called "Asymmetric Perceptions of Conformity".

Everyday experience and decades of research make clear that instances of conformity are all around us. The contention of the present article, though, is that there is one place where these instances are difficult to see: that is, in ourselves.

The root of this asymmetry, amongst other places, lies in the brain, in a phenomena called the "introspection illusion". Basically means we trust introspection (the reasons we attribute to ourselves for doing stuff) a bit to much and give it to much weight compared to other sources of reasons/motives behind our actions. Their is an asymmetry between how we weigh ourselves and how we weigh others - with others we weigh the behaviour more, so if it alligns with conformity, we say they are conformist even when we have access to their thoughts. On the other hand, if our behaviour aligns with conformity, we essentially deny the fact and attribute different reasons (based on introspection) for the behaviour. (Paraphrasing - hard to copy/paste from the pdf)

Study goes on and they run some few experiments to test out this. You can read on the pdf!

In the end we learn that, introspective illusion and 'behavioral disregard' are 2 sides of the same coin. They both imply a disconnect between our thoughts and our actions. Reliance on introspective data blinds the individual to their conformist nature because of this 'illusion' - at least in western cultures as this study was carried out on western students.

The consequences of this assymetry is conflict when dealing with others i.e. we see ourselves as better informed (alone/rational) compared to others (sheep/irrational) if their is differences in view.

So we all believe we are the 'great man' in Ralph Waldo Emerson's quote at the top because of this introspective illusion.

There is also another paper I found about the same subject

_http://cbdr.cmu.edu/seminar/pronin.pdf

People see themselves as less susceptible to bias than others. We show that a source of this bias blind spot involves the value that people place, and believe they should place, on introspective information (relative to behavioral information) when assessing bias in themselves
versus others. Participants considered introspective information more than behavioral information for assessing bias in themselves, but not
others. This divergence did not arise simply from differences in introspective access. The blind spot persisted when observers had access to
the introspections of the actor whose bias they judged. And, participants claimed that they, but not their peers, should rely on introspections
when making self-assessments of bias. Only after being educated about the importance of nonconscious processes in guiding judgment and
action—and thereby about the fallibility of introspection—did participants cease denying their relative susceptibility to bias.

Well...uhmm the above at least explains my understanding on the whole thing. Quite hard to paraphrase!!

 

[Mr. Premise]

That makes a lot of sense and fits well with the other cognitive science material. I think a lot of the Work is learning to judge ourselves by our actions and not the self-justifying narratives we create.

 

[obyvatel]

[quote author=luke wilson]
By everyone, I mean, uhmm, the grad students who took the studies who supposedly represent the whole western culture. But hey, these is how most studies are done!
[/quote]

True. There has been some studies on this sample population as well. They are given the acronym WEIRD - western educated industrialized rich democratic. The topic is discussed in
Do humans all share the same cognitive machinery? .

 

[luke wilson]

I've been reading a bit more about conformity. From the studies, we are shown that we do conform to certain extent to our surrounding environments and the groups that we belong to. This can be both good (get acceptance) and bad (join in, in evil acts). Some people are more likely to conform than others as demonstrated in Asch's Conformity Experiment but everyone denies the power conformity has on them as shown in the above studies about the asymmetry in perception.

This play of conformity/non-conformity in our internal dialogue and external actions is I believe heavily used in social engineering and manipulation of the general public, both in marketing and in general shaping of behaviour.

One of the questions I have is, why is it that in western culture, individualism is celebrated but in practise, non-conformity is met with either emotional or physical violence? Look at how people who deviate from the norms e.g. by how they look, by their religion, by their culture, by where they come from are treated. In one sense, the west sells itself as the most accepting of cultures, having taken in the whole world, but on the other, it meets everyone who is not essentially western with violence? This happens on an individual, group and national level. What is all this about?

These are such big contradictions it is mind boggling. It seems even on the macro level, the disconnect between the internal dialogue and the external action exists, in this sense all levels are a reflection of each other. It seems that the introspective illusion doesn't only exist in what an individual tells him/herself about themselves but also what groups of people tell themselves about themselves - look at the US, the levels of delusion are vast between what they say about themselves and their actions as a whole entity. Look at Christianity and the crusades/inquisition, the differences between the internal dialogue and the external actions or even in modern times with the paedophile priests...

The introspective illusion puts forward the idea that we can't truly know why we do certain things, that we don't have that level of access to the brain and to hide this fact, we simply fabricate internal dialogue and string stories for consistency. This makes sense but in ancient times for example, how does this fit in with for example the shamanic principle? It appears that if such people might have existed in the past, then they could dive beyond the illusion and connect with the real reasons underneath, if not, how could their ever have been shamans? In terms of us and our current times, where does this leave the notion of know thyself and even self observation when we are blind to so many biases?

 

[gdpetti]

"What is all this about?" Sounds like the typical imperial mindset of 'Do as I say, not as I do'.... believe only me, and no one but me.... monotheism et al. Sort of reminds me of a form of entrainment... entrapment of the mind, body and soul... get 'em while their young and dumb and easily molded. Celebrate our specialness, as long as it's our kind of 'togetherness', Heil Hitler and all that jazz. Seems that if you can engrain this type of mental programming in the youth, after a few generations, they are essentially zombies at your command... as long as you don't let that curtain slip. Maintain the lie... wasn't that essentially a infamous quote from someone back in bush Jr.'s administration? Tell a big lie and keep telling it? Pretty soon, it's just accepted as the truth and no one in their 'right' mind would ever think to question the obvious, right?

Doesn't this idea of conformity run along the same lines as cognitive dissonance? Along the lines of this introspective issue? And by the same conditioning coaches? Which is everyone that came before us, parents, teachers, friends and family... the usual suspects of conformity, based here in the West in the delusion of group superiority, which easily manifests as personal superiority, and 'Damn you if you think otherwise!' Don't some, if not most, of the 'doctors' at the various torture camps think that they're doing a 'good' thing? Isn't this what they've been dumbed down or conditioned to think? Same as the soldiers, the media et al? Conformists teaching us when it is 'right' to fight, flight or freeze? Conformists teaching us what is or isn't conformist or introspective? Teaching us that we are special, thus smarter than the other guys... they're so stupid, right? 'They're so stupid, they think they're special, how stupid is that? What me?! Oh, no, I'm not one of them! I'm different, I know the difference, don't you? What's wrong with you? You seem delusional to me. You stupid people are all the same... come here and I'll tell you what you should do... just do and say like I do...'

The introspective conformity of a 2 year old? But with the same inherent risk of running away and doing whatever they like if it feels good at the time... Historically, this seems to be the hallmark of an empire... which rises as does the growth of the empire, and falls with its fall. I read a blog commentary the other day (written by woman in Japan,who moved there with her husband from the USofA, during its bubble phase) in which she states how great they thought they were (at least along certain lines of industrial production, efficiency etc by comparison) .... until this bubble phase started to evaporate and leave them back where they started after the war in a weakened and vulnerable state of mind.... then all the decades of 'fixes', same as we have been busy with here in the States... we've been fixing education, poverty, unemployment for how many decades now? How long did it take to instill this conformity of opinion that 'things need to change', 'something must be done'. Some 'wars' never seem to end, they conform to the same delusion of introspective deception from the top down... and now the war on terrorism... not to mention the similarity of all central bank policies in 'fixing' their respective economies.... they are all doing the same thing, to a greater or lesser extant.... as if it mattered, because they are all joined at the hip and rise and fall with each other... like it or not... if not, then you have to leave the comfort of this conformity with its built-in delusion of greater introspective worth.

In the end, it seems all about the ego, as usual. Stroke yours and stunt it in others. The 2 year old showing their younger sibling how to do things, of course intent comes into play in how that relationship works. The collective mindset of 'together we rise, together we fall' or should that be 'together I rise, and separately you fall'? The perspective of the 2 year old again? The same issue of how one sees oneself... special or less than special. All it takes is that one little doubt in the ego and others will jump on it and prove to you how special they are in comparison to you. Stroke that ego.... and if others allow them to masturbate in this fashion, they will become what we are today, working hard to maintain that delusion of specialness.

Reality is making it harder all the time... if only this cognitive dissonance was outlawed, declared illegal or something... as something's gotta be done! Somebody do something! ;D