Understanding Society
The Dangers of Pluralistic Ignorance
EDITORIAL INTRODUCTION
Pluralistic ignorance begins when people privately reject a behavior but assume everyone else accepts it. In Rutger Bregman’s Humankind: A Hopeful History, Doug moves from college binge drinking to racism, political violence, and an arresting image: ants following one another in a fatal circle. The escape route is equally social. One person resists the group, and trust — like hatred — can become contagious.
A Note on the Original Text
Doug’s writings are presented as originally written. Spelling, punctuation, and grammatical irregularities have been retained to preserve his words and the integrity of the original record.
ORIGINAL WRITING
The content in this post is based on the book Humankind: A Hopeful History by Rutger Bregman.
…research shows that the effects of pluralistic ignorance can be disastrous—even fatal. Consider binge drinking. Survey college students on their own, and most will say that drinking themselves into oblivion isn’t their favorite pastime. But because they assume other students they try to keep up and everyone ends up puking in the gutter.
Researchers have compiled reams of data demonstrating that this kind of negative spiral also factors into deeper societal evils like racism, gang rape, honor killings, support for terrorists and dictatorial regimes, even genocide. While condemning these acts in their own minds, perpetrators fear they are alone and therefore decide to go with the flow. After all, if there’s one thing Homo puppi struggles with is standing up to the group. We prefer a pound of the worst kind of misery over a few ounces of shame or social discomfort.
This led me to wonder: what if our negative ideas about human nature are actually a form of pluralistic ignorance? Could our fear that most people are out to maximize their own gain be for the assumption that that’s what others think? And then when we adapt a cynical view when, deep down, most of us are yearning for a life of more kindness and solidarity?
I’m reminded sometimes of how ants can get trapped crawling in circles. Ants are programmed to follow each other’s pheromone trails. This usually results in a neat trail of ants, but occasionally a group will get sidetracked and wind up ‘traveling’ in a continuous circle. Tens of thousands of ants can get trapped rotating in circles hundreds of feet wide. Blindly they carry on, until they succumb to exhaustion and lack of food and die.
Every now and then families, organizations, even entire countries seem to get caught in these kinds of spirals. We keep going around in circles, assuming the worst about each other. Few of us move to resist and so we march to our own downfall.
It’s been fifty years since Bob Rosenthal’s career began, and to this day he still wants to figure out how we can use the power of expectation to our advantage. Because he knows that, like hatred, trust can also be contagious.
Trust often when someone dares to go against the flow—someone who’s initially seen as unrealistic, even naive. In the next part of this book, I want to introduce you to several such individuals. Managers who have total faith in their staff. Teachers who give kids free rein to play. And elected officials, who treat their constituents as creative, engaged individuals.
These are people fueled by what William James, the Father of American Psychology called ‘the Will to Believe.’ People who recreate the world in their own image.