The Vividness Bias
The Israeli psychologists’ Danny Kahneman and Amos Tversky transformed our understanding of human behavior with their discovery of the many hidden forces that shape our decisions—from small choices, like what to eat, to major ones, like whether to go to war. This transformation has many components and several names, but it’s most widely known as behavioral economics, a field that combines ideas from psychology and economics to explain why people often act in ways that don’t make logical sense. At the heart of this field is Kahneman and Tversky’s discovery that, rather than relying on logic or probability, people often make choices using primitive rules of thumb and mental shortcuts—or heuristics in the language of academia—that allow for quick decisions but are prone to error and bias. One such mental shortcut is known as the vividness bias. When evaluating investments, for instance, investors might overvalue companies led by bold, charismatic founders, while underestimating those with quieter leaders focused on the subtle, behind-the-scenes work. Our tendency to overvalue what is vivid and obvious while overlooking subtler qualities that may be more important than they appear—that’s the theme of this SIX at 6…
Basically, I Don’t Look Like An NFL Quarterback
When Tom Brady was coming out of college, the scouting report on Brady read, “Poor build. Very skinny and narrow. Lacks mobility. Looks a little frail and lacks great physical stature and strength. Lacks mobility and ability to avoid the rush. Lacks a really strong arm. Can’t drive the ball down the field. Does not throw a really tight spiral.” “Basically,” Brady said, “they’re saying that I don’t look like an NFL quarterback.” Lacking the vivid traits of an NFL quarterback, Brady was drafted late in the second-to-last round of the 2000 NFL Draft. Asked what the scouts overlooked, Brady said, “I think they underestimated my competitiveness. I think they underestimated how much I really enjoy playing football. When it’s your priority, when it’s something that is very important in your life, when you love to play the game—I mean, that says a lot. That says that you’ll do just about anything to get where you want to go.” Along with his competitiveness and relentless work ethic, Brady’s scouting report could have read: Smart. Great at reading defenses. Stays poised under pressure. Very dedicated to preparation. Lacks an ego. Known for his ability to inspire teammates. Filled with these non-vivid qualities, Brady went on to play 23 seasons in the NFL, winning a record 7 Super Bowl titles, 3 NFL MVP awards, and a record 5 Super Bowl MVPs.
How Can It Be That It’s Done In A Second?
As the graphic designer Paula Scher has become a master of her craft, she’s experienced an interesting problem. “A lot of clients like to buy process,” she explains. “they think they’re not getting their money’s worth [if] you solve the problem too fast.” This is known as the “Labor Perception Bias”—our tendency to equate the value of a service or product with the amount of visible effort and time spent on it. When we don’t see a certain level of labor, we may feel skeptical or shortchanged, even if the outcome is exactly what we wanted. If a contractor completes a repair quickly, for example, we might doubt whether they were thorough enough, assuming good work should take more time. Similarly, Scher was hired to design a logo when Citibank and The Travelers Insurance Company merged in 1998. In the first meeting, she drew what became the iconic Citi logo on a napkin. As Scher got up to leave the room, someone from the Citi team, overlooking the years and years spent developing the subtle traits that allow experts to deliver high-quality results quickly, asked, How can it be that it’s done in a second? “It’s done in a second and 34 years,” Scher replied. “It’s done in a second [and] every experience and everything that’s in my head.”
The Daily Frustrations of Wasted Effort
The vividness bias shows up in the day-to-day frustration of putting in effort with no visible payoff. As a researcher, for instance, I might spend days reading a thick biography, looking for material for myself or others to use in their writing. Often, I come up empty-handed, which can be frustrating. Without something tangible to show for it, I used to feel that the work was a waste of time and energy. Over time, though, I’ve come to see these efforts differently. Even when there’s no tangible takeaways, the time isn’t wasted. All time spent reading is time spent strengthening my ability to focus, to stay engaged, to discern good material from bad. It’s time spent expanding my background knowledge, which gives me a richer perspective for future reading and writing. And sometimes, the payoff only shows up later, in an unexpected idea or connection sparked by those hours of unproductive reading that had once felt like a waste of time. These subtle benefits can be found in all kinds of day-to-day tasks, as effort often pays off in ways that aren’t immediately vivid.
Doctor, Lawyer, Engineer, Failure
The comedian Hasan Minhaj performed stand-up comedy for 10 years, one month, and nine days before his parents saw him perform stand-up comedy. Hasan, the son of Muslim Indian immigrants, was raised by parents who had left behind their homes, family, friends—everything they knew—to build a better life for their children in the United States. From their perspective, Hasan’s choice to pursue comedy seemed like a waste of all they had sacrificed. They saw comedy as a lowbrow sideshow, cheap entertainment for drunks and lowlifes in dingy bars. “My parents felt like they invested so much in me,” Hasan said, “and now I’m performing in basements for drunks. To them, it was like, ‘You’re so much better than this.’” Hasan had all the vivid traits of someone destined for a visibly respectable career—he was smart, got good grades, and excelled on his high school’s Speech and Debate team. “We’ve seen you put your mind to academics,” Hasan’s parents would say to him, “and you do so well. Why are you doing this? Why are you throwing it all away for comedy?” “The choices,” Minhaj says of his parent’s expectations for him, “were doctor, lawyer, engineer, failure.” So, Hasan says, “for my first decade as a comedian, it was real rough between me and my parents. We didn’t talk a lot.” For his first decade as a comedian, Hasan lacked the visible markers of success that his parents valued so highly. Then in 2014, Hasan was hired as a correspondent on The Daily Show, hosted by Jon Stewart. His parents, Hasan said, “held Jon in the same esteem that they held [the journalist] Dan Rather. Jon doesn’t just tell jokes to drunk people in a basement at 2 o’clock in the morning.” After Hasan was hired, he told Jon, “my parents know you.” “Jon didn’t understand the magnitude of what that meant,” Hasan later said. “It was a huge deal. I had been doing stand-up for 10 years, one month, and nine days. And to finally have something where your parents know what it is,” to finally have something tangible that broke through the vividness bias that had clouded their perception of his work, “it was just — it meant everything to me.”
The Invisible Work
“When we look at the changes and transformations in other people’s lives,” Robert Greene has said, “we see the visible signs of opportunity and success. But we are grasping at an illusion. What really allows for dramatic changes are the things that occur on the inside of a person and are completely invisible: the slow accumulation of knowledge and skills, the incremental improvements in work habits, the ability to withstand criticism. Any change in people’s fortune is merely the visible manifestation of that deep preparation, of all of the internal, invisible aspects that lay the groundwork for the change in fortune.”