{"id":41304,"date":"2025-03-20T17:57:13","date_gmt":"2025-03-21T00:57:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/?p=41304"},"modified":"2025-03-20T18:01:17","modified_gmt":"2025-03-21T01:01:17","slug":"41304-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/41304-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Emotionally Delusional Herding"},"content":{"rendered":"

As I read through Bobby Duffy’s Why We’re Wrong About Nearly Everything<\/em>, I would ask myself, my husband and sons the questions from the surveys and was pleasantly surprised that our estimates where closer to the actual numbers than the average reply.\u00a0 This clearly shows that my family is the exception to the rule, and we do not have delusions.\u00a0 Obviously, I say this in jest, our assumptions revealed a lot of how we see the world. On teenage births,[1]<\/a> the 4-year Muslim population,[2]<\/a> and immigrant population[3]<\/a> we were close to the actual and even estimated closely for other countries. The survey on women in politics was an eye-opener for us. We were all shocked that only 19% of American politicians are women.[4]<\/a> The men in my family are champions of women in leadership, my husband advocating nationally for equal women leadership in our denomination. To realize that our country was still so behind, was disheartening. We chuckled (because we didn’t want to cry) at the question on who would win the election between Clinton and Trump.[5]<\/a> How could so many countries, including our own, think Clinton would win and then have it end in victory for Trump. This little family survey was fun and gave insight, but I should probably move on to the real deal.<\/p>\n

Emotionally Delusional <\/strong><\/p>\n

Duffy makes a key point that emotional responses shape peoples view of reality, making for one-sided delusions.[6]<\/a> Emotions are significant to how we see politics.\u00a0 People are not the rational decision makers that objectively elect politicians based on preferred policies. Politicians often play on voter\u2019s emotions misdirecting them from true reality.[7]<\/a> Duffy encourages individuals and society to be aware of the emotional views that are brought into what we choose and our understanding of what will happen[8]<\/a>. Emotional response to issues that concern us, lend to overestimating its prevalence in the community.[9]<\/a>\u00a0 Immigration, unemployment and poverty are examples of concerns that Duffy uses to show how people feel like the issue is much bigger than it is. We should not deny how much our emotions play into our perceptions but should seek to understand them.\u00a0 The key is to challenge the immediate thinking that accompanies the emotion and spend time complimenting on the thoughts.[10]<\/a> Buffy uses Kahneman’s system 1 and 2 to explain deeper thinking to move from the reactive emotion to rational system 2 thinking.[11]<\/a><\/p>\n

Misinformation<\/strong><\/p>\n

In our current political situation, it seems misinformation is continually increasing.\u00a0 Trump has often claimed fake news of opposing media, while, also, being connected to many false stories and claims himself[12]<\/a>. \u00a0Media and the internet continue to spread biased misinformation.\u00a0 Buffy talks of how our online community confirms our biases because we will receive mostly information, whether true or not, that confirms our existing views.[13]<\/a> We share, like, and comment what others would expect us too in our media circles, further filtering what information we see.[14]<\/a> I immediately thought back to The Atlantic article by Johnathan Haidt, \u201cThe Dark Psychology of Social Networks\u201d. Haidt shared how the more inflammatory or emotional a post is the more it gets liked and shared. This is how misinformation spreads.[15]<\/a> The American Psychological Association confirms this effect, \u201cPeople are more likely to share misinformation when it aligns with personal identity or social norms, when it is novel, and when it elicits strong emotions.\u201d[16]<\/a><\/p>\n

Duffy ends with light at the end of the tunnel.\u00a0 He encourages individuals to have deeper engagement[17]<\/a> and society to work on regulations to control the spread of misinformation.[18]<\/a> \u00a0While he recognizes that dealing with delusions is multi- faceted and complex, he says there are practical ways for truth to emerge with rational thinking and the importance of our emotions.[19]<\/a> He leaves us with the hope that things aren\u2019t as bad as they seem.[20]<\/a><\/p>\n

___________<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> Duffy, Bobby. Why We\u2019re Wrong About Nearly Everything. <\/em>New York, Hachette Book Group. 2018; 59<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> Duffy 109<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> Duffy 95<\/p>\n

[4]<\/a> Duffy 141<\/p>\n

[5]<\/a> Duffy 168<\/p>\n

[6]<\/a> Duffy 20<\/p>\n

[7]<\/a> Duffy 149<\/p>\n

[8]<\/a> Duffy 170<\/p>\n

[9]<\/a> Duffy 144<\/p>\n

[10]<\/a> Duffy 231<\/p>\n

[11]<\/a> Kahneman, D. Thinking Fast and Slow<\/em>. New York: Penguin. 2011<\/p>\n

[12]<\/a> Duffy 161<\/p>\n

[13]<\/a> Duffy 177<\/p>\n

[14]<\/a> Duffy 178<\/p>\n

[15]<\/a> Haidt, Johnathan, Tobias Rose-Stockwell \u201cThe Dark Psychology of Social Networks\u201d The Atlantic. December 2019: 5<\/p>\n

[16]<\/a> American Psychological Association. \u201cHow and why does misinformation spread? March 1, 2024. <\/em>https:\/\/www.apa.org\/topics\/journalism-facts\/how-why-misinformation-spread<\/p>\n

[17]<\/a> Duffy 239<\/p>\n

[18]<\/a> Duffy 235<\/p>\n

[19]<\/a> Duffy 241<\/p>\n

[20]<\/a> Duffy 241<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As I read through Bobby Duffy’s Why We’re Wrong About Nearly Everything, I would ask myself, my husband and sons the questions from the surveys and was pleasantly surprised that our estimates where closer to the actual numbers than the average reply.\u00a0 This clearly shows that my family is the exception to the rule, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":218,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[3405,2640],"class_list":["post-41304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-dlgp4","tag-duffy","cohort-dlgp04"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/218"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41304"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41304\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41308,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41304\/revisions\/41308"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}