Overcoming Bias

Share this post

Social Norms Are Far

www.overcomingbias.com

Discover more from Overcoming Bias

This is a blog on why we believe and do what we do, why we pretend otherwise, how we might do better, and what our descendants might do, if they don't all die.
Over 11,000 subscribers
Continue reading
Sign in

Social Norms Are Far

Robin Hanson
Jan 14, 2013
Share this post

Social Norms Are Far

www.overcomingbias.com
7
Share

We see social norms as more relevant when predicting the average behavior of a group, relative to predicting an individual’s behavior:

In judgments of morally relevant behaviors, forecasters estimated that a randomly selected individual (e.g., a student) would act more selflessly (e.g., give to charity) than would the population from which the individual was drawn (e.g., the student body). … When considering how an individual will behave, people give weight to an individual-level force on behavior: what an individual’s moral conscience would lead one to do. When considering a population, forecasters give more emphasis to a group-level force on behavior: social norms and pressures. … Individuals were [also] forecast as more likely than populations to perform behaviors that emerge primarily because of an individual-level force—a person’s will—but not behaviors that are encouraged by social norms. (more)

Share this post

Social Norms Are Far

www.overcomingbias.com
7
Share
7 Comments
Share this discussion

Social Norms Are Far

www.overcomingbias.com
lloyd12
May 15

I agree with Dave on this. There must be an equal contribution from every individual in order to keep a balance.http://www.genericviagra123...

Expand full comment
Reply
Share
TGGP
May 15

A number of commenters have said something to the effect of "but individuals can be different than the average". Yes, that's true. And the standard deviation reflects how far from the mean we might expect them to be. But we DON'T know in which direction they will deviate from the mean. There is no more reason to believe a random person will be more selfless than average than to believe they will be more selfish. The expected value of their deviation from the average is zero, even if the expected absolute value of said deviation is positive.

Expand full comment
Reply
Share
5 more comments...
Top
New
Community

No posts

Ready for more?

© 2023 Robin Hanson
Privacy ∙ Terms ∙ Collection notice
Start WritingGet the app
Substack is the home for great writing