Whether it『s your sibling, best friend, parent or even your boss, you』ve called someone stupid at some point in your life。 But how do we even define 「stupid」 behavior, and what can we do to avoid acting stupidly?
「Although calling something stupid is a frequent everyday behavior,」 Balázs Aczél, a psychology professor at Eotvos Lorand University in Budapest and a co-author of the study, told The Huffington Post in an email, 「there has been no psychological study to understand why and when people use this label to describe the observed actions。」
The researchers found that, despite the ambiguous definition of 「stupid,」 there was a 90 percent rate of agreement between participants in which actions were seen as stupid。 The researchers also noticed that there were three different types of behaviors, which were most often deemed as stupid。
「In our statistical analysis of the data we found that people regard stupid action in three different categories: (1) violations of maintaining a balance between confidence and abilities; (2) failures of attention; and (3) lack of control,」Aczél said。
Aczél described it as 「confident ignorance,」 or when someone is overconfident about their ability to do something。 An example of this behavior is when a driver refuses to ask for directions, and might end up lost。
Aczél稱之為「自信的無知」,或是當一個人對自己做事能力的過度自信。這一行為的一個例子就是司機開車不問路而最後卻迷路了。
2、Lack of control
2、缺乏控制力
A lack of willpower or control might be when your friend is on a diet but buys cookies in the grocery store 「just in case。」
意志力或控制力不強可能指的是你的朋友在節食減肥,但還是在小賣部買了餅乾「以防萬一」。
3、Absent-mindedness
3、注意力不集中
Absent-minded behavior could be described as when someone who buys a car doesn『t know how to change the oil, and thus, the vehicle breaks down on the side of the road。