Understanding Others by Adjusting from the Self
Thomas Gilovich
(Cornell University)
March 8th
Lubrano Conference Room

Abstract

How do we understand the contents of someone else’s mind? One much-discussed possibility is by examining the contents of our own minds, and making whatever adjustments are necessary to accommodate differences in perspective, motivation, prior belief, etc. It has been maintained that such an adjustment-based process is likely to lead to egocentric biases because the adjustments one makes are typically insufficient. But the validity of any such adjustment-based account of egocentrism is been called into question by recent research on the grandfather of all adjustment models--the anchoring and adjustment heuristic--that indicates that no such adjustment occurs. This research, conducted most prominently by Thomas Mussweiler and Fritz Strack, has established beyond any reasonable doubt that anchoring effects, at least within the standard anchoring paradigm, are not the result of insufficient adjustment, but are instead the product of heightened accessibility of anchor-consistent information. What, then, to make of the many theoretical accounts of various egocentric phenomena that assign a significant role to processes of (insufficient) adjustment? This talk will introduce research indicating that anchoring AND adjustment is alive and well outside the standard anchoring paradigm. When anchors are self-generated, not provided by an experimenter or other outside source, the resulting judgments are in fact the product of true adjustment. Various egocentric biases therefore do indeed seem to be the product of insufficient adjustment and people do indeed seem to understand the contents other minds by adjusting from the contents of their own.