Cognitive Dissonance
In this short video, Michael Beale introduces the fascinating subject of cognitive dissonance. As a coach and influencer, it’s really worth understanding.
What is Cognitive Dissonance?
It is the huge mental discomfort we all experience when something happens that conflicts with our current beliefts, values, and ideas. Because the discomfort is so disturbing, we create new ideas and beliefs to absorb it and make it fit into our view of the world. Even if our logic seems utterly crazy to everyone else.
Cognitive dissonance can be seen all the time when a smoker justifies why he or she doesn’t stop smoking in light of all the evidence of the harm that tobacco can do.
As a coach, trying to help a client bring about positive change, it’s worth remembering that you cannot always win an argument with facts. If the facts don’t fit with the way the client views the world, they will never accept them. To the contrary, the facts that are meant to change behaviour actually add more structure to reasons to stay the same.
Read about confirmation bias and heuristics, effects and biases to understand more about this.
See more on Wikipedia.
The next section explores Confirmation Bias
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What is NLP Section Index
1: What is NLP | What is Neuro-Linguistic Programming
2: The NLP Adventure Starts
3: Mental maps and world view
4: Cognitive Dissonance
5: Confirmation Bias
6: More Heuristics, Effects and Biases
7: What does NLP offer?
8: Do I need a coach?
9: Get the most of this guide?
10: Exercise
11: Summary
What is NLP | Cognitive Dissonance