We are all cursed…..
Imagine us standing in a pub together (back when that was still possible) and we are participating in a pub quiz. Almost winning... the final question is coming up: Name a famous song by Queen. We both yell out “We will rock you!” Can you not hear the song playing in your head?
In 1990, Elizabeth Newton obtained her PhD in psychology at Stanford by studying a game in which she assigned people one of two roles: "tappers" or "listeners”.
Tappers received a list of twenty-five well-known songs. Each tapper was asked to choose a song and tap out the rhythm for a listener by knocking on a table. The listener's task was to guess the song based on the rhythm that was tapped. Beforehand, tappers predicted what percent of the listeners would guess the song correctly.
What do you think happened? In the course of Newton's experiment 120 songs were tapped. Tappers predicted that about half of the songs was guessed correctly. Yet listeners only guessed three out of the 120 songs! Why was that?
This phenomenon is known as the curse of knowledge. And we all suffer from it.
When a tapper taps, she hears the song in her head. It's impossible not to hear the melody in your head. Meanwhile, listeners can't hear that song - all they can hear is a bunch of disconnected taps. In the experiment, the tappers are baffled at how hard the listeners seem to be working to pick up the melody. Isn't the song clear?
It's hard to be a tapper. The problem is that the tappers have been given knowledge: the title of the song. When they tap, they can't imagine what it's like for listeners to hear isolated taps instead of a song. This is the curse of knowledge. When we know something, it's hard for us to imagine what it was like not to know. Our knowledge has "cursed" us. And it becomes difficult for us to share our knowledge with others, because we cannot easily recreate the state of mind of our listeners.
The tapper/listener experiment is performed every day all over the world. The tapers and listeners are CEOs and frontline staff, teachers and students, politicians and voters, marketers and customers, writers and readers. All of these groups depend on continuous communication, but like the tapers and listeners, they suffer from enormous information imbalances.
And you, I’m sorry to tell you – you also suffer from this. Legal professionals are very focused on the risk, details and potential threats. Especially legal professionals have a very detailed level of knowledge of the law, as they should have. But this is creating a disadvantage when communicating. All this detailed knowledge is standing in your way, because you can’t image what it is like without out that knowledge. You can not not hear the song playing in your mind. How to solve it? It starts with being aware of the phenomena and taking a second look at your client communicate from their point of view. Try to step into their shoes and determine their knowledge level and information appetite. Wonder if only a written text will do the trick or if (adding) visual(s) aid might be more effective in getting the point across. Not simplifying. But clarifying.
Legal Design | Designed for Insight
teamlid juridisch
4 年Thanks for this sharing these taps of yours :-). And I would like to add to taking a look: listening is the key for sending a message which can be received by the other.
Performance Coach for Executives, Business Owners and Professionals
4 年I really like this analogy Sarah, thanks for sharing! I was once told that if I cannot explain a concept in a way in which an 8-year-old would understand, then I don't yet know it well enough myself. Children love visuals too! Perhaps this is another nice test to run to help add some melody to the sparse vibration of the taps we often try to communicate with.