Mistakes Were Made

Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts [Kindle Edition]

Author: Elliot Aronson | Language: English | ISBN: B003K15IOE | Format: PDF, EPUB

• Description
• Book Details
• Table of Contents
• Reviews

Mistakes Were Made : Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts
Download for free books Mistakes Were Made : Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts from 4shared, mediafire, hotfile, and mirror link

Why do people dodge responsibility when things fall apart? Why the parade of public figures unable to own up when they screw up? Why the endless marital quarrels over who is right? Why can we see hypocrisy in others but not in ourselves? Are we all liars? Or do we really believe the stories we tell?

 

Backed by years of research and delivered in lively, energetic prose, Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me) offers a fascinating explanation of self-deception—how it works, the harm it can cause, and how we can overcome it.

Direct download links available for Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts [Kindle Edition]

• File Size: 694 KB
• Print Length: 309 pages
• Page Numbers Source ISBN: 0151010986
• Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; 1 edition (May 5, 2008)
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
• Language: English
• ASIN: B003K15IOE
• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• X-Ray:
  Enabled
• Lending: Not Enabled
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,121 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
  • #5 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Professional & Technical > Professional Science > Behavioral Sciences > Cognitive Science
  • #5 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Science > Behavioral Sciences > Cognitive Psychology
  • #5 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Professional & Technical > Professional Science > Behavioral Sciences > Cognitive Psychology

Ready for a whirlwind tour through time and space, from the Crusades and the Holocaust to the war in Iraq, from recovered memories and the fallacies of clinical judgment to false confessions, wrongful convictions, and failed marriages? Then this is the book for you.

What ties these disparate topics together, according to tour guides Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson, is the notion of "cognitive dissonance," which has been creeping into popular awareness in recent years. Cognitive dissonance is the uncomfortable feeling created when you experience a conflict between your behavior and your beliefs, most specifically about who you are as a person. ("I'm a good person, I couldn't do this bad thing.") To reduce dissonance, people engage in a variety of cognitive maneuvers, including self-serving justifications and confirmation bias (paying attention to information that confirms our beliefs while discounting contrary data).

Tavris and Aronson, both top social psychologists and excellent writers to boot, make their point through the repeated use of a pyramid image. Two people can be standing at the top an imaginary pyramid and can undergo the same dissonance-inducing experience. Person A processes the experience accurately, which leads him down one side of the pyramid. Person B engages in a series of defensive maneuvers to reduce cognitive dissonance that eventually lands him at the opposite side of the pyramid. Once at these opposite poles, the two can no longer recognize their initial similarities, and see each other as unfathomable and even dangerous. A particularly compelling, real-life example is two men who experienced a terrifying episode of sleep paralysis in which they saw demons attacking them.

Mistakes Were Made : Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts Download

Please Wait...