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Speaking club on Sunday, at 12 p.m. New York time and on Google Meet. Free and open to all of you. We're going to meet and practice our speaking!
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We tend to overestimate how many people agree with us.
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Daily English Pod — False Consunsus Effect. Machine-transcribed; use the interactive transcript above to jump the player to any line.
0:00Hello everyone and welcome to a weekend episode of Daily English, where we try to grow in English and in life. Today's idea is simple, but de-establishing in a healthy way, it's called the false consensus effect. Consensus means agreement by the way, and it means this. They tend to overestimate how many people agree with us. When we hold a belief about politics, parenting, success, relationships, even lifestyle, our brain quietly assumes most reasonable people think like I do. It feels obvious. It feels normal. It feels common, but often it isn't. Psychologists have shown that people consistently believe their own opinions are more widespread
1:06than they actually are. Why? Because our environment is filtered. We talk to people similar to us. We follow people similar to us. Algorithms show us content that matches our preferences. Our social world becomes an echo chamber, and the echo sounds like consensus, like agreement. This effect does something powerful. It makes this agreement feel shocking. It makes difference feel threatening. It makes us think, how can they believe that? But the other person is thinking the same thing. The false consensus effect doesn't mean you're wrong. It means your perspective feels larger than it is. And that can create overconfidence, or frustration, or social tension.
2:12This applies beyond politics. If you think everyone wants this lifestyle, everyone cares about this, everyone would react like this, pause, ask yourself, is this common or just in my circle? The world is wider than our feet, and most of us are living in slightly customized realities. Let me leave you with this. The agreement feels natural when you're surrounded by it. But difference becomes visible only when you step outside your circle. Thank you for being here today. And before I go, don't forget that tomorrow at 12pm New York time, we have a free speaking club. An open space for everyone where we practice our speaking skills and social lines.
3:14We just need to click the link in the description and join in. I'll be more than happy to see you there.
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