I walked out of my first examination almost certain I had failed. I got my results back, and learned I had passed with honors. This situation repeated itself with depressing regularity over the next few semesters.
Back during my schooldays I was often certain that I had failed a test, just like many other people in my class. It turned out that most of the time the others didn’t fail the test while I did. I concluded that they are for some reason just bullshitting about their self-assessments, it didn’t occur to me that they just repeatedly failed to accurately predict their own success.
My brother said to me a few days ago that “whenever I think I’ve done well, I’ve done terribly, and whenever I think I’ve done terribly, I’ve done well.”
Hrmm. That one could be related to impostor syndrome, maybe. However, what this thread has really established is that people can have any possible combination of experiences with test results (always thinking you’ve done badly, always thinking you’ve done well, thinking the opposite of what actually happened, and actually being right.)
Interestingly, just yesterday, I got back the results of a math test and an English paper. I was convinced I was firmly in the B+ range on the test, and ended up with a C-; I was also convinced that I was in the C+ range on the paper, and got a solid A. I’ve noticed that my expectations are often inaccurate, but they’re accurate enough that I’m hesitant to simply negate them.
Back during my schooldays I was often certain that I had failed a test, just like many other people in my class. It turned out that most of the time the others didn’t fail the test while I did. I concluded that they are for some reason just bullshitting about their self-assessments, it didn’t occur to me that they just repeatedly failed to accurately predict their own success.
I often walk out of an exam thinking I did brilliantly, only to be highly surprised with my crap grades later.
My brother said to me a few days ago that “whenever I think I’ve done well, I’ve done terribly, and whenever I think I’ve done terribly, I’ve done well.”
Hrmm. That one could be related to impostor syndrome, maybe. However, what this thread has really established is that people can have any possible combination of experiences with test results (always thinking you’ve done badly, always thinking you’ve done well, thinking the opposite of what actually happened, and actually being right.)
Interestingly, just yesterday, I got back the results of a math test and an English paper. I was convinced I was firmly in the B+ range on the test, and ended up with a C-; I was also convinced that I was in the C+ range on the paper, and got a solid A. I’ve noticed that my expectations are often inaccurate, but they’re accurate enough that I’m hesitant to simply negate them.
:) yet another example of “never attribute to malice what can easily be ascribed to incompetence”
As soon as this catches on, malicious people will learn to appear incompetent.