about elizabeth's entry

*this entry is my comments & thoughts to Elizabeth's recent posts (1 and 2), which I found them to be extremely interesting (as I almost always do as a matter of fact).

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Have you ever read "Blink?"  If you haven't, there's is a part where college students are asked to rank jam from best to worst.  And what's interesting is, if you just ask them to rank the jam, they do quite well - ranking them in nearly the same order as the experts.  But as soon as you ask them to explain their decision and then rank the jam - they start to screw up and their answers have no correlation at all.  The more they think, the stupider they become!



(Knotts Jam, the best of 'em all - ranked second when asked to rank - ranked last when asked to explain & choose)

The reason, according to Gladwell, is because we all know what good jam tastes like unconsciously, but when asked to evaluate a specific quality, such as texture for instance, our brains are puzzled (unlike food experts) by the fact we have to explain our unconsciousness, and come up with a totally random answer that we believe to be logical. 

So could it be - that attraction, like the taste of jam, is largely a subconscious decision and many of us might really suck at explaining them?  and that our explanations have very little correlation with how we would act in real life?  perhaps - I don't know for certain since I'm no expert at this matter but it is fascinating isn't it?  Your friends (including me) may have answered all the questions with honesty yet may act completely different in real life!  Could it be true that instead of asking them questions (even though it was yes or no), the only way we'll know for sure is through observing their behavior?  Here's an excerpt from Blink: 

(A women named Mary is speed dating, and I actually looked this up because I found this to be so interesting)

"...how good is Mary at predicting what she likes in a man?  Fisman and Iyengar can answer that question really easily, and what they find when they compare what speed daters say they want with what they are actually attracted to in the moment is that those two things don't match.  For example, if Mary said at the start of the evening that she wanted someone intelligent and sincere, that in no way means she'll be attracted only to intelligent and sincere men.  It's just as likely that John, whom she likes more than anyone else, could turn out to be attractive and funny but not particularly sincere or smart at all.  Second, if all the men Mary ends up liking during the speed-dating are more attractive and funny than they are smart and sincere, on the next day, when she's asked to describe her perfect man, Mary will say that she likes attractive and funny men.  But that's just the next day.  If you ask her again a month later, she'll be back to saying that she wants intelligent and sincere.

...Mary has an idea about what she wants in a man, and that idea isn't wrong.  It's just incomplete.  The description that she starts with is her conscious ideal:  what she believe she wants when she sits down and thinks about it.  But what she cannot be as certain about are the criteria she uses to form her preferences in that first instant of meeting someone face-to-face.  That information is behind the locked door (unconscious)."



...of course everyone who commented on the post may be an "expert," and has an ability to read the information behind the locked door, though I doubt it.  We eat and analyze food multiple times everyday, but we still can't read the information behind the locked doors.  Attraction?  that occurs far far less than eating.

So what I'm saying is, I think there's a big chance that many of your friends will act differently (by that I mean about two of the questions they might act differently) in "real" life.  Take me for example.  I said that I liked younger girls, yet I just realized I've only dated girls around my age and older!!!

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anyways, I'm disappointed that only four people commented on my previous entry, despite the fact that I waited a whole week, and the fact that it was the first time I ever asked anyone to participate.  In fact, I'm trying to decide if there's even a point to blogging anymore since I rarely have any response.  I mean, the point of blogging is to share with public - or else, we can always just write entries in our diary right?

I hope I don't sound bitter - if I do, I don't mean to.

Anyways the list of characteristics & career choices were taken from the Briggs-Myers test.  I know, we've all heard about it a gazillion times, but I finally think I know what I am in the test - an ENTP (with extroversion and introversion very close), so I really wanted to see if my perception of myself matched how others perceived me.  So I copied & pasted the list of characteristics for ENTP's, picked out the traits the described me, and asked others to participate as well.  Sadly, we don't have large enough sample size, which means it's pointless to write an entry about it.


And to people that answered, a very big thank you.  I really appreciated it.