Word of mouth
For many generations, there have been many misguided folk beliefs about oral communication. For example, because the phrase "opposites are attracted" is catchy and easy to remember, people tend to tell others about it. Many legends are spread in similarly, for example, you may have heard the story of alligators living in the New York City sewerage system, or of a well-meaning but stupid woman who has placed her wet poodle in a microwave oven to dry it out, and he's there exploded. For years, the first author of this book tells a story he has heard many times, namely, a story about a woman who bought what she thought was a tiny Chihuahua puppy, and a few weeks later was a giant rat at the vet's office. Although such stories can be the subject of a spicy conversation at the dinner table, they are no more true than any of the psychological myths we will present in this book. If we hear a statement many times, it does not mean that it is true. But repetition can make us accept this statement as correct, even when it is not, because we can confuse its popularity with its veracity. Advertisers who keep telling us, "Seven out of eight dentists recommend Brightshine toothpaste, which is superior to all other brands! Research shows that when we hear one person repeating an opinion 10 times ("Joe Smith is the most competent person to be president!"), it can lead us to believe that this opinion is as widespread as if we had heard it once from 10 people. To hear is sometimes to believe, especially when we hear a statement many times.
The desire for easy answers and quick solutions
Let us confess that everyday life is not easy for even the most adapted of us. Many of us are struggling to find ways to lose weight, to sleep, to answer exams well, to enjoy our work, to find a loved one. So it's not surprising that we cling to techniques that offer clear promises of quick and painless behavioral changes. For example, bizarre diets are very popular, even though research shows that most people who use them return their weight in just a few years. Speed-reading courses are equally popular, with many promising to increase reading speeds from 100 or 200 words per minute to 10,000 or even 25,000 words. However, researchers have found that none of these courses increase reading speed without reducing reading comprehension. Also, most of the reading speeds advertised in these courses exceed the maximum reading speed of a person's eyeball, which is approximately 300 words per minute. One word for smart people: if something seems too good to be true, it's probably true.
Unrepresentative sample
In the media and many areas of everyday life, we often encounter a non-random or, as psychologists say, "unrepresentative" sample - the opinion of people representing the entire population. For example, about 75% of mentally ill people are portrayed in TV programs as violent, although they are much less violent. Such distorted media coverage can lead people to misperceive that most people with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder (once called manic depression) and other serious mental illnesses are dangerous to others. Psychotherapists are particularly likely to make mistakes in this regard because they spend most of their time with an unrepresentative group of people, namely people undergoing psychological (psychiatric) treatment. Here is an example: many psychotherapists believe that it is very difficult for people to quit smoking on their own. However, studies show that many, if not most, smokers manage to break the bad habit without formal psychological treatment. These psychotherapists are likely to fall victim to what statisticians Patricia and Jacob Cohen have described as an illusion of a clinician - the tendency of doctors to overestimate the degree of chronicity (aging) of a psychological problem because they encounter chronic cases selectively. That is because they usually only see people who cannot stop smoking on their own (which is why they came for help), these clinicians tend to overestimate the inability of such smokers to give up cigarettes without treatment.