Most people rate themselves above average on desirable traits and skills, which cannot be true of most people.
In a faculty survey K. Patricia Cross reported in 1977, more than nine in ten college teachers rated themselves above average and two-thirds put themselves in the top quarter. Svenson found the same pattern in drivers in 1981. The testing version came in 1987, when Cannell showed that every American state was reporting above-average results on norm-referenced tests, because the norms were years out of date and classrooms had learned the tests.
In practice
- A school where every teacher's self-assessment reads 'exceeds expectations' has told its managers nothing about who needs support.
- Every member of a pub quiz team leaves believing they carried it, and the answer sheet says otherwise.
- Standing
- Reverses on hard tasks, where people rate themselves below average (Kruger, 1999), so it tracks how easy a skill feels as much as vanity. Part of the gap is noise in self-rating. Compare the Dunning–Kruger effect.
- Subject
- Psychology & Behavior
- Essay
- A century and a half of measuring the mind