Day 48: One thing I learned today…
Have you heard of the Ebbinghaus illusion (pictured). The center circle on each size is the same but depending on which set of circles you are looking at and the reference points (the circles surrounding the center circle) may influence your thought on which is larger.
So the next question is…
Is Bronze better?
A study was conducted reviewing video clips from the 1992 Summer Olympic Games in Barcelona, Spain. Twenty Cornell University undergraduates served as participants. They watched the videos (without sound) and rated the expressed emotions of each athlete on a 10-point.
The bronze medalists appeared happier on average than their counterparts who won silver medals. Within the discussion of the paper, the bronze medalists have just won a match or a game in comparison, the silver medalists have just lost.
An example was given with wrestling. A bronze medalist would have just defeated the fourth place finisher, and the silver medalist would have just lost to the gold medal winner.
Is the gold winner a good reference point for others’ happiness? The idea behind this paper is that the Silver Medal winners use the Gold winner as a reference point. The Bronze winners uses ’no medal’ as a reference point. Each have different reference points.
We are constantly judging relative to other stuff in the world. Are these reference points messing up our happiness?
I recently heard the quote from Karamo Brown “Comparison is the Thief of Joy” which originated with Theodore Roosevelt and found it fitting
Source: Medvec et al. (1995). When less is more: Counterfactual thinking and satisfaction among Olympic medalists.Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 69(4), 603–610.
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