Dunning-Kruger Effect
The Dunning-Kruger effect is the pattern where low-skill people overestimate their ability and high-skill people underestimate theirs.
Why are beginners overconfident?
Recognizing good performance requires the same skill as producing it. Beginners lack the meta-cognitive ability to see the gap between their work and an expert’s, so their incompetence is paired with blindness to that incompetence (the “dual-burden account”).
- Personally relevant: tendency to feel above average while only knowing things at surface depth
- Linked to “you don’t know what you don’t know”; see Johari Window