Even though it was originally a tool for important tasks like these, the world's numbskulls have decided to make things like Buzzfeed the most popular. Okay, maybe that's not a surprise, but Buzzfeed is still pretty awful.
No, this actually isn't a
rant about how terrible Buzzfeed is, but this site in particular
makes a wonderful point about how our minds love responding to
fallacy. Websites like Etsy.com (so you can buy your jock strap,
remember?) just aren't quite as intriguing.
Or, not in the same way. .
.
There is a plethora of
quizzes on this site, and I don't know if I've seen a single quiz
that doesn't follow the title template of “What ________ are you?”
That blank could be anything: Disney character, instrument, type of
cheese, even piece of pizza.
How does that last one even make sense? If I am a piece of pizza,
I'm just a piece of pizza, and I'm not going to care about which one
I am, so WHY should anyone?
I hate
Buzzfeed with enough passion that, if concentrated into a usable
source of energy, it could power the world for at least two months.
But there is something interesting with each imbecilic quiz result:
not only does it tell you what type of alcoholic beverage you are, it
tells you why you are a Pabst Blue Ribbon beer. (The answer, of
course, is that you are cheap and don't know that most people would
choose an unholy concoction of pig urine and swamp water over you.)
Yeah, it's really that bad.
The
“why” is where it becomes fascinating: how could answering
questions that should lead to the type
of alcohol you are also tell you who you
are?
Bertram
Forer was a very intelligent man with extraordinary talents. With
over 85% accuracy, he could do what these tests claim to do and
discern a person's personality upon first meeting him or her. What
he had were very powerful investigation and observation skills, and I
personally went out on my own, attempting to mimic his abilities.
After a
lot of practice, I got pretty decent at it, and I know most of you
are probably skeptical, like I'm doing that John Edward
pseudo-psychic thing where you just ask vague questions like, “Oh,
I'm sensing some darkness here. Have you lost a loved one?” This
is a stupid approach, because most people have lost someone important
in their life, but they still assume he (i.e. John Edward) “knew”
this happened. He didn't, obviously.
The
point is, I know to a much more certain degree than John Edward's
idiotic manipulation who you are and what you're like, just because
you're reading this blog post.
You have a great desire for other people to like and admire you. You have a tendency to be critical of yourself. You have a great deal of unused capacity which you have not turned to your advantage. While you have some personality weaknesses, you are generally able to compensate for them. Disciplined and self-controlled outside, you tend to be worrisome and insecure inside. At times you have serious doubts as to whether you have made the right decision or done the right thing. You prefer a certain amount of change and variety and become dissatisfied when hemmed in by restrictions and limitations. You pride yourself as an independent thinker and do not accept others' statements without satisfactory proof. You have found it unwise to be too frank in revealing yourself to others. At times you are extroverted, affable, sociable, while in other situations you may be introverted, wary, reserved. Some of your aspirations can be pretty unrealistic. Security is one of your major goals in life.
Pretty
spot-on, right? Unless you're fighting me tooth-and-nail on this,
you can admit that I was probably close with most of those
things .
But they
weren't actually my results; they were Bertram Forer's, modified
slightly to fit a specific audience (i.e., you). Forer was
actually a psychologist in the mid-to-late twentieth century, and to
every one of his subjects, he gave those “observations.” After
they picked up their dropped jaws, he explained how he “knew” so
much about them.
Apparently, Forer just compiled a bunch of horoscopes to create his results, which further shows why so many people wrongly believe this astrological bullcrap (pardon that tautology) today: we as humans are totally willing to ignore blatantly indistinct conclusions, as long as it's about ourselves.
There are two variables that must be in
place for this to work, though. First, you have to have some
authority when you say it. You don't have to be a psychologist to
fool people, no, but you should pretend you are.
And second, the traits should be
phrased positively, which is simply because people don't like
negativity in general. Instead of saying, “you do not have even
the basic skills of a cucumber,” it should be, “you have a very
specific set of abilities.”
Hey, I remove cellulite!
So, when I say, “you have the
ability to excel in your field,” you'll assume I mean it as a
compliment, and that you're skilled in your low-wage burger-flipping
position. But I probably mean, “you can do more with your life,
you lazy bag of filth.”
And just for your personal reference,
this is also referred to as the Fill in the Blank Effect and the
Barnum Effect (after the circus guy), and is closely related to
subjective validation. And if you don't remember all three of those
names, a special officer corps will extricate you from your bed and
exile you to a dank cave for the rest of your existence, while you
subsist on cooked guano (that means bat poop, guys) and sediment
water. Or not.
Anyway, after reading all of this and
coming so far, I'm sure you've gathered how this relates to Buzzfeed.
In case you didn't figure it out (which is totally okay), it's
related because the quiz results on this site are only as correct as
you make them. They can't tell you specific traits about yourself,
only vague platitudes that could apply to anyone .
So if you're going along in life,
trying to figure out what kind of cheese you are, you don't have to
settle for Limburger because Buzzfeed said you were. You can be
Brie. You can. Trust me.
And if you want to be champagne instead
of Blue Ribbon beer, well. . . I'm sorry. That's all you get.
Original passage used by Bertram Forer, 1948:
You have a great need for other people to like and
admire you. You have a tendency to be critical of yourself. You have
a great deal of unused capacity which you have not turned to your
advantage. While you have some personality weaknesses, you are
generally able to compensate for them. Disciplined and
self-controlled outside, you tend to be worrisome and insecure
inside. At times you have serious doubts as to whether you have made
the right decision or done the right thing. You prefer a certain
amount of change and variety and become dissatisfied when hemmed in
by restrictions and limitations. You pride yourself as an independent
thinker and do not accept others' statements without satisfactory
proof. You have found it unwise to be too frank in revealing yourself
to others. At times you are extroverted, affable, sociable, while at
other times you are introverted, wary, reserved. Some of your
aspirations tend to be pretty unrealistic. Security is one of your
major goals in life.
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