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Overcoming Bias Commenter's avatar

I think the accepting of advice can be very difficult. In the EO network (entrepreneur organization) people are taught to share relevant experience not advice. In my experience this avoids the issues noted related to advice giving and getting as well as acknowledges no two situations are the same.

As I do with my kids I would do with my other self's.

Share the personal experiences that are related to the issues, listen to others experiences and integrate that into my decision.

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Wei-Hwa Huang's avatar

In real life, I am usually generous and give advice to people, but exceptions are made when I am potentially in competition with those people. If I'm at a sporting event or playing in a chess tournament, I will not give my opponent advice on how best to beat his opponent (namely, me). However, if I don't perceive them as a threat (e.g., I'm teaching an inexperienced player how to play a game), then I am much more generous with the advice.

The converse is also true. If my opponent tries to talk to me during a competition, I'm going to be wary of their advice. In a teaching environment, great.

In a cooperative environment, the drive to give and receive advice is even stronger. If our goals are better achieved by working together, then yes, come with the advice!

What is interesting is when one side believes the environment is competitive and the other side believes the environment is cooperative. A scenario might be two people working for the same company -- are they both cooperating because they both want the company to do well, or are they competing for one job opening?

I think overall, whether the environment is cooperative or competitive matters a lot more than whether the other person is a genetic copy of me or not. Of course it does matter to some extent -- even though I share 90% of my genetic information with a housecat, I'm not very likely to give or receive advice from it.

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