Why do we make the same mistakes over and over? How does brain work?
If you find yourself doing the same mistakes over and over again, you are not alone. Here is how and why the brain does not learn.
Making mistakes is okay. It is the only way to understand what works for you, what is in your capability or not, but making same mistakes over and over again might be frustrating. Why do we do that? A British academician has shared his ideas on this very subject. Let's take a look.
The reason lies in how our brains process information and make templates that we use over and over again. We can use these templates as shortcuts to make decisions in the real world. However, these shortcuts, or heuristics, can also cause us to make the same mistakes again.
The academic recalls that in psychology this situation is called "confirmation bias"
Confirmation bias is a cognitive bias that causes people to search for, interpret, and remember information in a way that supports their current beliefs. In other words, people tend to affirm what they already believe rather than change their mindset to incorporate new information and ideas.
"Sometimes we hold on to certain behavioral patterns and repeat our mistakes because of an 'ego effect' that forces us to hold on to our current beliefs," Agarwal says. We are likely to choose knowledge structures and feedback that allow us to protect our egos.
