Why We Make Mistakes summary

A recent survey revealed that a quarter of its respondents couldn’t remember their own phone numbers.

Why is it so difficult for us to recall such information?

Our ability to make snap judgments based on appearances has been shaped by our evolution. For instance, we might decide whether to eat a banana based only on its color: if it’s yellow, we’ll eat it, but if it’s green or dark brown, we won’t.

While this ability to make very quick judgments using only superficial information has helped us in our survival, unfortunately it also leads us to make mistakes.

When Parisians were asked to draw a map of their home town from memory, nearly every participant straightened the River Seine.

Why?

Have you ever wondered how interpreters are able to translate rapidfire conversations between people in a split second?

The answer is that interpreters don’t wait until each sentence has been completed but instead recognize patterns the moment the first words are spoken. This enables them to complete any given phrase very quickly.

Is there someone in your life who always insists they knew exactly how things would turn out?

The tendency of people to embellish and distort the past to show themselves in a more positive light is manifested in various erroneous ways.

Whenever we have a lot of tasks to do in very little time, we often turn to multitasking. And why not? On paper, multitasking seems like the only way to get everything done in time.

But is it actually possible to perform different tasks at the same time?

Imagine you’re planning to join a gym, where you’re presented with various membership options: the yearly contract, the monthly membership and the pay-as-you-go option. Which one would you choose?

If you’re like most people, you’d choose one of the longer-term contracts – and end up overpaying. Like almost everyone else, you’d overestimate how disciplined you’d be about sticking to your exercise regimen.

In several American hospitals, newborn babies had repeatedly been given near-fatal doses of a blood thinner.

How could this happen? The cause of the almost deadly mistake was simple: the vials containing the standard dose looked very similar to those containing a much higher concentration.

So, now that you’re aware that many of the mistakes you make stem from common and predictable problems in your thinking rather than random, individual “glitches,” you can use this information to help you avoid making mistakes.

How?

The key message in this book:

Many of the mistakes we make don’t spring from individual malfunction, but are directly related to the way we human beings think and perceive the world. By learning to recognize our own susceptibility to error, you can offset it and avoid making mistakes in the future.