The worse-than-average effect or below-average effect is the human tendency to underestimate one's achievements and capabilities in relation to others.
It is the opposite of the usually pervasive
better-than-average effect (in contexts where the two are compared or the
overconfidence effect
The overconfidence effect is a well-established bias in which a person's subjective ''confidence'' in their judgments is reliably greater than the objective ''accuracy'' of those judgments, especially when confidence is relatively high. Overconfide ...
in other situations). It has been proposed more recently to explain reversals of that effect, where people instead underestimate their own desirable traits.
This effect seems to occur when chances of success are perceived to be extremely rare. Traits which people tend to underestimate include
juggling
Juggling is a physical skill, performed by a juggler, involving the manipulation of objects for recreation, entertainment, art or sport. The most recognizable form of juggling is toss juggling. Juggling can be the manipulation of one object o ...
ability, the ability to ride a
unicycle
A unicycle is a vehicle that touches the ground with only one wheel. The most common variation has a frame with a saddle, and has a pedal-driven direct-drive. A two speed hub is commercially available for faster unicycling. Unicycling is prac ...
, the odds of living past 100 or of finding a
U.S. twenty dollar bill on the ground in the next two weeks.
Some have attempted to explain this
cognitive bias
A cognitive bias is a systematic pattern of deviation from norm (philosophy), norm or rationality in judgment. Individuals create their own "subjective reality" from their perception of the input. An individual's construction of reality, not the ...
in terms of the
regression fallacy or of
self-handicapping
Self-handicapping is a cognitive strategy by which people avoid effort in the hopes of keeping potential failure from hurting self-esteem. It was first theorized by Edward E. Jones and Steven Berglas, according to whom self-handicaps are obstacles ...
. In a 2012 article in
Psychological Bulletin
The ''Psychological Bulletin'' is a monthly Peer review, peer-reviewed academic journal that publishes evaluative and integrative research Literature review, reviews and interpretations of issues in psychology, including both qualitative (narrative ...
it is suggested the worse-than-average effect (as well as other
cognitive bias
A cognitive bias is a systematic pattern of deviation from norm (philosophy), norm or rationality in judgment. Individuals create their own "subjective reality" from their perception of the input. An individual's construction of reality, not the ...
es) can be explained by a simple
information-theoretic generative mechanism that assumes a noisy conversion of objective evidence (observation) into subjective estimates (judgment).
See also
*
Dunning–Kruger effect
The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which people with limited competence in a particular domain overestimate their abilities. It was first described by the psychologists David Dunning and Justin Kruger in 1999. Some researcher ...
*
List of cognitive biases
Cognitive biases are systematic patterns of deviation from norm and/or rationality in judgment. They are often studied in psychology, sociology and behavioral economics.
Although the reality of most of these biases is confirmed by reproducible ...
References
{{Reflist
Cognitive biases