DPD-Delusional Parent Disorder

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Apr 1, 2010
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This probably applies to parents watching their kids in sports. The more you know about the game, the more flaws you'll see in your DD's game. Of course, the more you will see flaws in others as well, but if nothing else, that knowledge of the game should make you humble.

Meanwhile, I think a lot of parents who overrate their children in sports just don't understand the game that well. They aren't biased as much as they are, for a lack of a better word, ignorant. Maybe they don't see the big picture. They assume that if their kid's team won 8 tournaments last year that all those players must be some of the best in the state. But they have no idea what level they're playing, or what really made the team win, who the difference-makers were, etc.

I've always found the research on the Dunning-Kruger effect fascinating. I believe I heard or read somewhere that it's a good idea to become very knowledgeable at something...anything!, so that you would begin to grasp the vast gulf between ignorance and expertise. It follows that if you had previously been unaware of thousands of things about x, that you must be equally unaware of thousands of things about...everything. The opinion of someone who has pertinent knowledge (like the UIC) might just be due more weight than the opinion of the 8U parent in the stands... ;-)
 
Apr 1, 2010
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There is an actual disorder called The Dunning–Kruger effect

"The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which an unskilled person makes poor decisions and arrives at erroneous conclusions, but their incompetence denies them the metacognitive ability to realize their mistakes. The unskilled therefore suffer from illusory superiority, rating their own ability as above average, much higher than it actually is, while the highly skilled underrate their abilities, suffering from illusory inferiority."

I know a good number of people who suffer from both the positive and negitive of this disorder.

When both groups, the highly skilled and the unskilled, were given a chance to come to a better sense of their abilities through grading a sample selection of tests, the highly skilled then realized that they were at the upper end of the curve and changed their self-appraisal. The unskilled were still unaware. =:-O They had to receive training before they were able to distinguish good performance from poor.
 
Nov 29, 2009
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When both groups, the highly skilled and the unskilled, were given a chance to come to a better sense of their abilities through grading a sample selection of tests, the highly skilled then realized that they were at the upper end of the curve and changed their self-appraisal. The unskilled were still unaware. =:-O They had to receive training before they were able to distinguish good performance from poor.

The most dangerous guy in any project is not the guy who knows nothing, nor is it the guy who knows a lot. It's the guy who knows just a little bit. And for some reason he almost ALWAYS seems to be in charge.
 

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