Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Self perception

Psychology has been one of my fascination for long. Starting with popular 'How to win friends' and 'Why men don't listen', to more academic 'Design of everyday things', 'Paradox of choice' and 'Man who mistook his wife', I have devoured psychology readings with relish. Then there are myriads of articles ranging from how people stand in elevators (to avoid eye contact and maintain equal distance) to how men chose urinal from the row in bathroom (to be farthest from door and maximize distance from existing users). Observing people in their interaction with other people and surrounding is fascinating at social, cultural and biological level.

What people say about themselves is also insight into realm of their thinking. Reading many "about me" sections on Orkut, it is interesting to note that everybody has best of opinions about himself/herself. People are aware of their limitations, yet to self, they are also nicest people to people around them. They don't hurt anybody with their words and actions, are good friends, are enjoyable company, and generally speaking good human being. Notwithstanding the fact that each of us knows among his/her friends some who aren't quite what they say they are. Fascinating part is that they are not pretending but genuinely believe so about themselves. A thief would also consider himself/herself good and will have justifications for his/her acts. What it may mean that either everybody is generally good at heart or has potential to be, or everybody is living in an illusion.



Some of the interesting and path breaking studies in psychology:...and more from PsyBlog.

Breaking the Bias – Lessons from Bayesian Statistical Perspective

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