I ride the bus to the university everyday. I have really been able to plug into my cognitive miser lately. I think I am just more aware of my thoughts now that I have taken this introductory course of psychology. I am a compassionate person, generally and really have a hard time with judgmental people, but here in the middle of the 3A bus on Como Avenue, I am lurking as a cognitive miser. Look at that persons hair. I don't like that dress. Bet he's a brat. He must be late for everything. You get the picture. All of these lazy thoughts. There is no scientific information to back any of these thoughts that are most assuredly not accurate.Perhaps I'm just making myself feel better by noticing flaws, my thought, about others. Anyway, I don't believe there is any way to monitor these seemingly automatic thoughts. I am trying not to do it. I am trying not to be biased in my thoughts. I bet if I knew what others were thinking about me I might be more careful. To error is human, to forgive, divine. I apologize for my thoughtshttp://icanhascheezburger.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/funny-pictures-only-one-cat-had-a-cheeseburger.jpg What kind of unmonitored thoughts is the kitten on the right having?
Riding the Judgmental Bus
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I find myself making the same sort of "social commentary" that you're describing. My friends and I like to people-watch at the mall, so to some degree, this can be kind of fun. However, we should be careful about our automatic thoughts about people. It is hard not stop some thoughts from entering our mind so quickly, like "Oh, he's probably a stoner, look at his bleary eyes and unkempt hair." Like you said, people can be cognitive misers. I think it's best to change out attitudes little by little, and hopefully this will change out automatic thoughts.
I do that all the time too, but I don't feel quite as bad about it as you seem to. Taking those shortcuts to assess other people is adaptive. If you're about to interact with them, which you might considering how close they are to you, you need something to go off of to cue you on how to act. Those split-second decisions, while not necessarily accurate, need to be made.
As cognitive misers it's only natural that humans judge people. However it is important that we contain our thoughts so that they don't get out of hand or we keep them to ourselves. I also find myself doing this quite a bit, even when I make a note to change that about myself, but I just can't help it! It's always on my new year's resolution list to stop judging people. It is getting better as I grow and mature, though.
I also catch myself automatically judging people and being a cognitive miser. I also feel badly about it, but I think that that is the important thing: realizing I'm being judgmental. Yes, it's hard to stop those automatic thoughts, but then you can follow these thoughts with another thought that says: "Hey, that's probably an incorrect judgment of this person." Interesting post, thank you!
I think we all do those thoughts. And for the most part we all feel bad because the people we make comments about we have never met. However as previous students have said the first step is admitting and realizing we are submitting to the cognitive miser tendencies. But as a second point, like the book as has said, it is an adaptive tendency so that we can focus on what is absolutely necessary to our survival.
I definitely think that negative thoughts are common for any person. Unfortunately they usually come up at the worst time and leave you feeling so much worse than you thought you could have before. I know it made me feel better that during the Social psychology lectures Professor Gonzales mentioned that there truly is no way to repress these thoughts. I wonder why these thoughts even come into our head in the first place?