MOTIVATED REASONING
Motivated reasoning helps us to believe in our
own competence and goodness, to feel in control,
and to see ourselves in a positive light.
It shapes the way we interpret information and see our environment. It helps us to justify and validate our preferred beliefs. The way we view and assess information is highly correlated to our vested interests and to our sense of self.
Motivated reasoning happens outside
of our conscious awareness.
Therefore, people’s claims of being objective or unbiased may be entirely sincere even as they make decisions that are, in reality, self-serving.
For example, physicians may believe that they are immune from monetary influence yet studies confirm that accepting industry hospitality and gifts has a significant influence on patient care decisions. Investment managers’ estimates of the probability of certain events have been shown to have a significant correlation to their personal interest in those events.
Our computations and calculations are implicitly colored by who we are, what we believe and what we want. In fact, the motivated reasoning we engage in when we have a personal interest in something proceeds along a different neural pathway within the brain than our objective and disinterested analysis. When information that is consistent with our existing beliefs and desires enters the brain, it is immediately welcomed. When information that challenges our existing beliefs and desires, enters our brain, it is subjected to a gauntlet of challenges.
We poke holes in information we
don’t want to believe and find ways
to accept information we like.
The net effect on communication is to amplify rather than reduce disagreement.
When people want to believe a scientific conclusion, they’ll accept a vague news report of a random experiment as convincing evidence. And when they don’t want to accept something—like global warming exists—the fact that ninety-seven percent of scientists and the National Academy of Sciences support the conclusion will not be enough to convince them.
Through motivated reasoning, each side finds
ways to justify its favored conclusion and
discredit the other while maintaining a
belief in their own objectivity.
And since motivated reasoning operates outside of our conscious awareness, those on each side of an issue may genuinely believe that their view is the only rational conclusion. It rarely is.
What we need to learn from this is that those who disagree with us are not necessarily stupid or dishonest in their refusal to acknowledge the validity of our arguments. More importantly, we need to recognize that our own reasoning is very often less than objective. We need to be aware that both sides of any discussion may be assessing information in a biased manner while being unaware of doing so.
The human brain is designed to be both a conscious seeker of objective truth and an unconscious advocate for what we want to believe.
Together these approaches form our worldview. This is the inherent nature of your double-edged sword.
