How is it that the most competent people are also those who have the most tendency to the impostor complex... And conversely, that the people who are the least qualified on a subject are the most peremptory when they give their opinion, or even the most daring when it comes to taking it up ?

If you fall into the second category, you might be tempted to answer in Audiard's way: " F***ing dares to do anything. That's even how we recognize them." Otherwise, we invite you to discover the Dunning-Kruger effect.

It's the story of a very self-confident bandit...

Psychologists David Kunning and Justin Kruger began to take an interest in the theme of overconfidence by studying the case of a bank robber who, having heard that lemon juice had been used as sympathetic ink, decided to cover his face with it... To become invisible.

The robbery went wrong, that goes without saying. But there is indeed enough to look at the psychology of a person who is willing to put his life and freedom on the line in the name of such a stupid belief. But should we question the personality of the individual who would be endowed with tremendous self-confidence or should we rather be interested in the effects of the level of ignorance/knowledge on behavior ?

Was Darwin right ?

It is then necessary to verify Charles Darwin's hypothesis that " ignorance more frequently breeds self-confidence than does knowledge ".

To find out, the psychologists test four groups of students in different disciplines : logic, grammar and even a sense of humour. They then asked them whether they thought they were better or worse than the other members of the group in these areas.

The results speak for themselves: those who get the worst results are also those who overestimate their place in the ranking... And those who obtain the best results tend to think that they are worse than the others.

For this work, Dunning and Kruger won the Ig Nobel Prize, a parody of the Swedish Academy's famous distinction that distinguishes seemingly stupid research that leads to intelligent questions.

What bias is overconfidence the name of?

This question of the link between incompetence and self-confidence is very relevant. It refers to a cognitive bias that can be compared to the illusion of knowledge, the aversion to dispossession and the bias of self-indulgence.

Let's remember what it is about for each one:

• The illusion of knowledge is a bias that consists in considering that the information on a situation that one has is sufficient to apprehend this situation ;

• Dispossession aversion is a bias that leads to considering that what we own is more valuable than what we do not have (we believe that what we know is more important to know than what we do not yet know); 

• The self-complacency bias which consists of attributing one's successes to oneself and blaming one's failures on external causes.

The Dunning-Kruger effect, also known as the overconfidence bias, is at the crossroads of the relationship to knowledge and the relationship to self-esteem.

Our relationship to knowledge

As far as our relationship to knowledge is concerned, we can distinguish five phases :

• Complete ignorance: we know so little about a subject that we don't realize that we don't know. If one is questioned about it, one answers peremptorily, referring to one's beliefs and intuitions.

• Unconscious ignorance: we know little about a subject, so much so that we do not consider him or her an object of knowledge. We rely on his common sense and observations to put forward a point of view.

• Sufficient knowledge: we know things about a subject and we believe that what we know is enough to embrace its totality and complexity. We rely on our achievements to give relevant answers, without considering that there is more to know than what we already know.

• Developing knowledge: the knowledge we have of the subject makes us aware of the depth of the subject and subsequently of the full extent of what we still have to learn. We hesitate to take a position on the subject, feeling much more incompetent than competent to address it.

• Knowledge: we know more and more about the subject, we are constantly deepening it and we know by taking up the subject that we are legitimate to do so even if we will never be able to completely exhaust it.

This grid of phases of the relationship to knowledge already tells us that the person who speaks without knowing is not so much a self-satisfied scoundrel as an individual whose horizon of reflection is (for the moment) limited to the level of information at his disposal. When he gains access to more knowledge, there is a good chance that his belief that he is perfectly competent will be eroded a little... In favor of a gain in humility !

The game of self-esteem in the perception of competence

What the phases of the relationship to knowledge allow us to glimpse is that our feeling of competence depends only partially on our actual level of skills. Yes, but here's the thing: the feeling of being capable is a key component of self-esteem. It is therefore quite logical that the person who is at the top of the " mountain of stupidity ", as Dunning & Kruger calls it, has excellent self-esteem. Unaware of his incompetence, he/she has a warm ego.

But those who begin to become aware of the skills they lack plunge into the " valley of humility ". His self-esteem can be greatly destabilized. He/she will be quick to slow down in the face of challenges, to be cautious or even to discourage others from trusting him/her.

After this phase of taking into consideration the extent of his incompetence, the individual regains self-confidence by dint of developing his skills. From learning to experience, from satisfaction to success, he is getting closer to the " plateau of consolidation " which will always lead him lower in terms of self-sufficiency than he was at the top of the " mountain of stupidity " but leads him towards a more solid foundation of self-esteem.

Revisiting our approach to imposter syndrome

The Dunning-Kruger effect is therefore an invitation to rethink our approaches to imposter syndrome. For a long time, this complex was attributed to women, reproaching them for waiting until they had all or almost all the skills to apply for a position of responsibility, while men would be satisfied with 40% or 50% of the skills. And to consider that this gendered gap in behavior is due to female psychology or the weight of stereotypes that push them to feel inferior.

What if, quite simply, women were not in the same phase of the relationship to competence as men when they were sought out for leadership positions? Also, their humility when they refuse jobs by declaring that they do not feel capable, does not say that women are fundamentally less quick to be bold. Rather, it would say that their personal and professional life paths lead them earlier than men to become aware of what they do not know. The fact that they have more than men to prove that they are capable, to justify their expertise, to convince them that they can be trusted would lead them to ask themselves more about skills before taking the plunge...

The key to putting an end to the deception complex would therefore not be found so much in the confidence of women to be strengthened as in the generalization, among women and men, of healthy introspection on legitimacy. In the end, it would be a question of giving everyone the feeling that the place is not a given... And it could also be good for our companies !