【加队】一篇对打假傅苹事件的心理分析，因为随手写的，所以错误可能较多。

来源: dirtytalk 于 2013-02-11 21:51:54 [档案] [旧帖] [给我悄悄话] 本文已被阅读：次 (4007 bytes)

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Why we are suckers for lies?
A psychological explanation.

1, Association/representative/stereo type tendency
Association is one of the most powerful psychological tendencies hardwired into human brains by genes. It is developed by brain to handle vast amount of information. Simply speaking it's a shortcut to reduce information processing because our brains cannot process that much information we encounter every day. In our case, most of Americans have been conditioned by the media so that they think because communism/dictatorship=devil, China=communism/dictatorship so China=devil. So when they heard a bad story about Chinese government, they won't bother to check how much truth the story holds because it's must be true---it's coming from China "the Devil".

2, Availability-misweighing
We know that people tend to believe things that are more familiar to them, or can be better retrieved from their brain memory or more available to them. So obviously the China pictured by the media is more familiar to most Americans and therefore they tend to believe the book because it matches the China the media has pictured for them. And they never bother to collect more and unfamiliar facts about China or for that matter all unfamiliar foreign countries.

3, Avoid doubts tendency
Believe it or not, our brains don't like uncertainty. If given the chance, our brains will try to avoid doubts. If you heard the same kind of story but say it happened in Canada. You would doubt the truth of this story. But it happened in China, and you don't know much about China except from the media. And if China is already associated with devil, than your brains would take the chance to avoid doubts and believe the story.

4, Over optimism/wishful thinking tendency
We all know this saying "what a man wishes, that also will he believe". We all want to believe great stories (or wish great story to be true, just like we wish we could win lottery). Ping's story is a great one: not only had she survived one of the most brutal systems but also prospered after she came to America, fulfilled her American dream. Of course everybody wants to believe it. Who doesn't?

5, Authority
Ping's book got great reviews from some famous critics, so it must be true. She was also interviewed by the media, so it must be a true story. Is it really?

6, Social proof
We all know "monkey see monkey do". Everybody likes Ping's book, it must be good and true. Especially those Authorities like it. Authority compounding with Social proof sometimes could be very powerful.

Even after we know that the story is a lie, there is still people defending and justfying it. Why? See below:

7, Incentive-caused bias
Their logic goes like this: China is devil anyway, so what's wrong with fighting against it; we should use all tools we have, even lies. Maybe some people can understand this logic but it has nothing to do with truth and don't forget somebody is making a fortune out of a lie. Fighting devil and making money at the same time, what a great story. Is it about money or devil?

8, Self-serving
I am better than you guys so my opinions are better than you guys so I can't be wrong so you are wrong.

9, Denial
It looks very stupid if one found his/her previous statements are wrong especially publicly ones. It's painful to admit that you are wrong so the alternative is to keep your head in the sand.

10, Commitment and consistency
I have made a public statement about the book, so I have to be consistent with my opinion. I will ignore all unfavorable evidence and find all favorable evidence to support my opinion/theory.

So in summary, all these psychological tendencies work together in the same direction to mislead educated Americans to believe a lie. Two star for a great lie.