The Perils of Perception | Prof Bobby Duffy | PEriTiA Inaugural Symposium

Why do people some times get it so wrong when they 'know' all the answers?

Challenging current narratives on the so-called ‘post-truth era’, Professor Bobby Duffy explains that humans have a natural tendency to let our misperceptions run deep.

Based on his book Perils of Perception, drawing on more than 100,000 interviews across 40 countries, the King’s College London researcher argues there is a long-standing interaction between ‘how we think’ and ‘what we’re told’.

Speaking at the inaugural symposium for PeriTiA (Policy, Expertise and Trust in Action) – a new University College Dublin led Horizon 2020 project addressing trustworthiness of scientific expertise – Professor Duffy documented the enormous gap between facts and public perceptions on topics like immigration, public health and criminality.

For instance, across almost 40 countries surveyed for his studies, he found that the public grossly overestimates the number of teenagers giving birth each year.

In the UK, the average guess was 20% of girls ages 15 to 19 giving birth annually against the actual figure of 1.4%. percent.

Introducing his research on how misperceptions of reality are constructed and their impact on trust and expertise, Professor Duffy explained that humans humans focus on negative stories; assuming things are worse than they really are, and forgetting how bad things were in the past and how far we’ve come.

In reality, he said, the world is often better - and getting better - than we think.

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Funded for three years by the European Commission’s Horizon 2020 programme, PeriTiA will explore the conditions under which people trust expert opinion that shapes public policy.

Begun in February 2020, the project will bring together over 20 philosophers, social and natural scientists, policy experts, ethicists, psychologists, media specialists and civil society organisations to study trust in and the trustworthiness of policy related expert opinion.

PEriTiA Inaugural Symposium “Trust in a Changing World” took place March 2, 2020 in Newman House, University College Dublin

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