For me it’s: “Chronic cannabis use during adolescence impairs emotional development in adulthood” “Over achievement in crisis situations is an indicator of ADHD” Both of which provoke “Hmm, ya probably, and fuck you too”

    • Dasus@lemmy.world
      21·
      8 months ago

      As if self-diagnosing neuropsychologic conditions doesn’t utilise the same principle?

      “I’m so quirky, I forgot a thing once so I clearly have ADHD”

      The Barnum effect in psychology refers to the gullibility of people when reading descriptions of themselves. By personality, we mean the ways in which people are different and unique. However, it is possible to give everyone the same description and people nevertheless rate the description as very very accurate.

      They way I used to run this test was to give people some personality test on paper, then give everyone an envelope with a printout of their personality, have them rate the accuracy, and then reveal to everyone that they all got the same description. So, how can it be called accurate?

      https://psych.fullerton.edu/mbirnbaum/psych101/barnum_demo.htm