Why do we believe we have an objective understanding of the world?
Naive Realism
, explained.What is Naive Realism?
Naive realism is the tendency to believe that our perception of the world reflects it exactly as it is, unbiased and unfiltered. We often fail to recognize that our emotions, past experiences, or cultural identity influence the way we perceive the world, and thus believe others see it in the same way as we do. Naive realism rests on the idea that there is a material, objective world accessible to us and others around us.1
Where this bias occurs
Have you ever had an argument with someone over what the best TV show is? Let’s say your favorite show is Friends. You might have engaged in a heated debate over which is better—The Office or Friends—unable to understand how the other person perceives the two shows differently. How do they not see that Friends clearly has the best one-liners, and that Joey is the most hilarious character ever written?
One of the reasons we are so surprised when other people don’t have the same point of view as us is because of naive realism. We believe that a TV show, which exists as a material object that we can sense with our perception, exists outside of ourselves and can be objectively accessed through our senses.
Naive realism belongs to the egocentric bias category, a group of biases that indicate we rely too heavily on our own point of view and fail to understand that it is a personal point of view. These biases make it difficult for us to understand other people’s perspectives and can lead to arguments and polarization.2
