The Addictive Pleasure of Being Certain
Scientific American has an interesting interview with Neurologist Robert Burton about his new book, On Being Certain: Believing That You’re Right Even When You are Not.
His basic claim is that for every thought conscious or not, there is an automatic and independent assessment of the accuracy of that thought.
“Once we realize that the brain has very powerful inbuilt involuntary mechanisms for assessing unconscious cognitive activity, it is easy to see how it can send into consciousness a message that we know something that we can’t presently recall—the modest tip-of-the-tongue feeling. At the other end of the spectrum would be the profound “feeling of knowing” that accompanies unconsciously held beliefs—a major component of the unshakeable attachment to fundamentalist beliefs—both religious and otherwise—such as belief in UFOs or false memories.”
And this automatic assessment of our own thoughts can feel very good, powerfully so:
“Fortunately, the brain has provided us with a wide variety of subjective feelings of reward ranging from hunches, gut feelings, intuitions, suspicions that we are on the right track to a profound sense of certainty and utter conviction. And yes, these feelings are qualitatively as powerful as those involved in sex and gambling. One need only look at the self-satisfied smugness of a “know it all” to suspect that the feeling of certainty can approach the power of addiction.”
The design implications of this are strong.
Every time an artifact triggers a particular thought it also triggers an assessment of the accuracy of that thought. The mental states of users (the focus of cognitive design) will therefore be strongly determined by this second-order or meta thought. For example, if users are making mistakes but believe they are right, and they are certain about it, you have a serious cognitive design flaw. Think about people who insist on pumping anti-lock brakes.
Further, trying to learn how to use a new product or service that is complex should leverage my cognitive need for certainty-based-pleasure if it is really designed for how my mind works. I might be able to climb a much steeper learning curve if I can feel certain versus confused along the way, even if what I feel certain about is not essential.
