The Importance of Perspective-Taking
Contextual nature of memory
Our minds respond to cues in our surroundings to retrieve whatever it was that needed retrieving. In other words, we recall information better in the same environment as we stored it–or, in my case, the same environment that triggered the connection–to begin with. Context, in all its forms–visual, aural, olfactory, tactile–works as an essential memory cue. But can the connection go the other way around? Can a specific environment help trigger thoughts and associations that weren’t already there to begin with?
Perspective-taking is an essential part of interacting with the world: we need to be able to see things from others’ perspectives in order to understand them and interact with them. Indeed, the ability to take another’s point of view is a crucial early developmental step in the formation of Theory of Mind, one of the areas where individuals who suffer from autism are most lacking. But perspective-taking goes beyond the fundamental ability to realize that others don’t always see the same thing we ourselves see–even though unfortunately, for many people, it stops at precisely that point. We are not often trained to look at the world from another’s point of view in a more basic, broad fashion that transcends simple interaction. How might someone else interpret a situation differently from us? How might he act given a specific set of circumstances? What might he think given certain inputs? These are not questions we often find ourselves asking.
Indeed, so poorly trained are we at actually taking someone else’s point of view that when we are explicitly requested to do so, we still proceed from an egocentric place. In one series of studies, researchers found that people adopt the perspective of others by simply adjusting from their own. It’s a question of degree rather than type: we tend to begin with our own view as an anchoring point, and then adjust slightly in one direction, instead of altering the view altogether. Moreover, once we reach a satisfactory-sounding estimate, we stop thinking and consider the problem resolved. We’ve successfully captured the required point of view. That tendency is known as satisficing: a response bias that errs on the egocentric side of plausible answers to a given question. It’s especially strong when a plausible answer is presented early on in the search process–we then tend to consider our task complete, even if it’s far from being so.
And, the busier we are and the more pressured, the less accurate–and what is a police investigation but a time-sensitive pressure-cooker, with the weight of expected quick results on the shoulders of the investigators and a variety of plausible-sounding options that are all too tempting to grasp at awaiting analysis?
Perspective-taking is a tremendously difficult endeavor. It is far simpler to use yourself as the prototypical actor, often without realizing you’re doing so, instead of separating yourself entirely from the exercise. But it is nevertheless an essential skill. And so, we must use every possible tool at our disposal to improve our ability to see the world from a vantage point that isn’t our own; one such tool is as simple as a change of location–and if that location is the same as that of your target perspective, so much the better.
By Maria Konnikova
