One of the most intriguing aspects of human psychology is the tendency to perceive oneself in an unrealistically positive manner. This phenomenon, commonly referred to as “positive illusions,” can be observed in three main categories: inflated assessment of one’s own abilities, unrealistic optimism about the future, and an illusion of control. As Jonah Lehrer writes in his article, “The Future of Science is Art?”, “The history of science is supposed to obey a simple equation: time plus data equals understanding. One day, we believe, science will solve everything.” Though the fundamental principles of human psychology are largely conditional, and the mentioned theory can appear to be subjective, we believe there are still scientific rules that construct the world around us – even with something as transposable as human interaction. Thus, we have devised a project that will test how people’s estimation of their abilities changes based on the approval/disapproval of an audience. The following is an outline of our project’s execution:
There will be a number of different skills people can choose to perform. These will include (but are not limited to): singing, dancing, stand-up comedy, and storytelling. The skill must be something that can be performed in front of an audience for entertainment.
After choosing a skill, the subject will rank their proficiency of the skill on a scale of 1-10, 1 being “I couldn’t be worse,” 5 being “I’m average,” 10 being “I couldn’t be better.” Then, the subject will perform their skill via live webcam. The majority of the webpage interface will be taken up by the live image of the performing subject, so they can watch themselves as they perform. The audience will be completely invisible to the subject, the subject will only be able to see how many people are currently online watching their performance, and a meter showing the audience’s satisfaction with the performance. The meter will function on a similar 1-10 scale, 1 being “this is the worst thing I’ve ever seen,” 10 being the best. The meter will be a horizontal bar stretching across the bottom of the webpage beneath the live video, with a marker that slides back and forth based on the audience’s satisfaction. The marker on the meter will start out in the middle of the bar, at average.
When the subject begins to perform, audience members can use the “+” key to signify they are enjoying the performance, and the “–“ minus to signify it as unsatisfactory. One “+” click would change the score to 5.5, two “+” clicks would change the score to 6 (and vice versa for “–“ clicks). As the performance continues, an ongoing average will be taken of the audience’s cumulative scores, so the meter is constantly sliding back and forth and the subject can see how much the audience is enjoying their performance.
At the end of the performance, the final cumulative score of the audience will be presented to the subject. After viewing their score, the subject will be asked to rank the quality of that specific performance on the same scale. The subject will also be asked, “How well was this performance an indicator of your typical skill level?” and respond on the same 1-10 scale.
But there’s a catch: there is no actual audience watching the performance. We will control the scores given to the subject throughout the performance, pretending it was derived from the accumulation of a group of people.
There are three separate aspects of the project we will examine:
First, we will look at the role confidence plays in the performer’s success. As a performer watches their scores change throughout, will their actual level of performance be affected? For example, if someone was doing stand up comedy, and they weren’t being funny at all, but the meter was hovering around the 8-10 part of the scale, is it possible that this boost of confidence would actually make them funnier? Or, vice versa – if someone was singing and doing an amazing job, but the audience was giving them only 3 and 4s, would their singing get worse as they were stripped of their confidence?
Second, we will look at how the audience’s ranking of the subject affects how the subject rates themselves. For example, if you thought you were a 9/10 at singing, and after performing you’re final score was a 4, would you decrease your self ranking of the performance – even if you knew it was good? Can a crowd make you doubt yourself to such an extent? We have also considered the possibility that some people will be unaffected by the crowd’s rankings, if they are very confident in their ability at the skill (for example, a world class guitarist). To measure this data, we will compare how people ranked themselves before performing, to the audiences ranking of them, to their end ranking of themselves. We will display this data in a bar graph, and also calculate the exact numbers so we can say, for example, when the average person was ranked by the audience 6 points lower than they ranked themselves, and they decreased their own score at the end of the performance by an average of 3 points. It will be up to us to decide which scores the audience gives the performer, and we will start out by giving the performer an exactly opposite ranking of what they gave themselves, to try to evoke the most observable response possible. We will also experiment how a variety of different rankings affect the performer’s self score.
Lastly, we will be observing what types of emotional responses are evoked by the audience rankings. We will be looking to see if people become visibly upset when the crowd is dissatisfied with their performance, or visually joyful/surprised when the crowd approves. There is also a chance people may express verbal surprise at their rankings. We will record detailed accounts of any visual emotional responses, and on their body language in general, as they perform and after when they are reviewing their scores and re-ranking themselves.
The only materials necessary for this project are the online web platform, and anything else performers need to perform their skill set. We would take performers on a voluntary basis, and also encourage them to try skills outside of their comfort zone. Performers will be under the impression that they are involved in a form of competition, striving to do their best to get the best crowd ranking possible.
The conceptual significance of this project is applicable to both science and art, and the ways in which they overlap. In terms of the scientific world, it will be a very interesting human psychology experiment to see how people’s perceptions of themselves are impacted by what others think of them. As Sian Ede says in her article “Ambiguities and Singularities”, “Scientists invent extraordinary hypotheses and ask difficult questions about the meaning of life. They have insights into the workings of our bodies and minds which challenge the way we construct our identities and selves.” We are constantly hyperaware of how others are perceiving us, to the extent that our perceptions of ourselves are inseparable from our perceptions of how others are perceiving us.
In terms of the art world, it is a constant struggle for artist’s to first or all, protrude their art far enough out into the world to get a response, and second, to get a successful response. And if the response from the art world is not successful – how does that affect future production of work, and the artist’s creativity in general? Art will also constantly be made in the process of executing this experiment.
So how do art and science overlap, and work together to create something better than either could have on their own? The fundamental purpose of science and arts are often the same, but their execution differs. As Ariene Koke writes in his article “Cern: Where Art and Science Collide”, “the arts explore through the body and mind, often driven by the exploration of the ego, contradictions and the sheer messiness of life; science through equations, directed, collaborative research and experimentation that works in a progressive, linear fashion.” Our project incorporates both of these separate elements- the arts in the sense that we are exploring how people’s egos are affected by crowd’s reactions, the science through measuring these results through numerical data and treating the whole project as one might a scientific experiment.
Sources Cited:
Jonah Lehrer "The Future of Science is Art?" (Seed, 2007)
Ariane Koek "Cern: Where Art and Science Collide", The Art Newspaper (Oct. 2011)
Sian Ede "Ambiguities and Singularities" (excerpt from Art & Science, I. B. Tauris, 2006)
Links to Related Studies:
General Overview of Positive Illusions
Costs and Benefits of Positive Illusions
Separating Fact From Fiction