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I'm not sure your critiques invalidate the questions. This questionnaire isn't a value judgment on who you are as a person, it is simply exploring your behavior. Having good reasons for not giving the "right" answers doesn't mean the questions aren't poking at valid points.

I think you are right that they are getting to valid points, but I am saying they don't necessarily relate to a theory of intellectual humility.

Maybe that's why there are 9 questions, not one or two. So they together show a more exact picture

> 6) If someone doesn't understand my idea, it's probably because they aren't smart enough to get it. (reverse)

One of my high school teachers said something like: if someone doesn't understand your explanation, then you don't know it as well as you think you do.

It's also quite possible they lack the domain knowledge to receive a succinct explanation of the problem and evaluate if a solution actually solves it.

It's a classroom setting so the discussions are between peers with similar knowledge.

It is even more true in the real world when the discussions are between people with different knowledge. Do people recognize someone from another background as a peer or not?

If all parties are interested in the discussion they can ask questions to fill in gaps in the knowledge. Doesn't always happen of course.

That is possible, but it is unwise to bet that way.

Why?

First, because far more things can be explained to an intelligent lay person than most of us realize, and figuring out how to do so improves our own understanding. Therefore it is worthwhile to make the attempt.

Second, because it is far too easy to fool ourselves into thinking that we're making a succinct explanation that requires domain knowledge when actually we're spouting just enough jargon to remind those who agree with us of shared and possibly unexamined dogma. There is a real cost to mental habits that make such mental mistakes easier to make and sustain.

So yes. The other person may be too ignorant/stupid/whatever to understand you. But the alternative explanations should be disproven before you conclude that.

Not entirely correct

if someone doesn't understand your explanation, it might be that you don't understand the person well enough or you don't know the correct way to explain to that person in a plain language

I struggle with this when everyone outside of tech asks me what I do.

My answer always changes since I haven't narrowed down a way to describe "cloud engineering" to people.

I've heard this saying before and every time I think, "maybe I don't know what I do".

I always respond in layers. The first layer is to say I work in computers. If they want to know more, they'll ask. If there is a follow up question that doesn't make it clear they're tech savvy, I'll explain one level deeper. I work on the website for x company, or I help secure your credit card info at such and such back. It doesn't matter if you're front end, back end, dba, network, sysadmin, help desk, etc. Just something that a regular human might recognize as being a thing. Most people don't know what those job titles mean, but they know people must do something to make websites work and secure credit cards. And so on and so forth until it's satisfied their curiosity.

The key thing is knowing that their level of curiosity may not be what you prefer. I've come to terms that people often don't actually care about understanding what I do and would rather just make assumptions about it. If you can't accept that and let it be, you can become a very despondent person. :) And then when you try to correct their misunderstanding, you just make them unhappy too. Everyone loses.

Yep, if they're not actually interested, which is usually the case, you're either going to bore them or insult them because it will come off as bragging.

Richard Feynman said, "If you can't explain something to a first year student, then you haven't really understood."

Note that being great in every of these aspects can lead to suffering. Because most people don't and you'll be talked down regularly to the point of breaking. And it's utterly difficult to keep respect for people when you try to be balanced, team oriented and generous when others only know how to assert their POV and limited experience.

I agree with you. My honest answers to each of questions (save 8 and 9) are what the researchers would probably consider the "correct" response. Personally I don't like it when people point out my shortcomings or errors, but I'd argue those questions are under-specified. I may not like it, but I'll welcome it and earnestly assume they have some insight I do not.

In any case I think it makes me an unenjoyable person to be around. I more or less don't engage in opinionated discussion with people unless I'm intimately familiar with the topic at hand. Then it's no longer discussing opinions but trading facts. When I do engage, it's usually to ask questions of the other person's opinion without really challenging them. While I might agree with their opinions, I'm reluctant to refute them unless I can systematically prove them wrong. That's usually not possible, because they often know more than I do about any given topic. When I am asked questions directly I hedge my answers extensively.

When I was younger I used to take pride in this, but now I find it isolating. It's difficult to relate to people like this.

Like most people I also dislike being wrong. I’m also game for disagreements, which means I’m wrong a lot, easily the most on my team at work. I’d hesitate to say that makes me more “enjoyable” to my teammates.

More likely people find me difficult to take seriously because I’ll passionately argue for something I don’t necessarily have the best evidence for and then immediately give up and say I’m wrong when someone gives me the evidence I’m looking for.

Fun counter intuitive social trick :)

There's a thing called.. hmm .. positive negotiation ? when you interact with someone by always aiming at finding a middleground/compromise, rather than arguing for the sake of it.

Your point reminds me of something that I'm seeing (IIUC). A lot of the time people will assert more than they know (I do that sometimes too[0]) and the discussion will stop. By insisting even at the risk at being wrong, you force everybody to show their hand and sometimes they'll realize that they may be wrong or off point and that they need to reevaluate the situation. .. We're tribal, even in scientific fields.

> By insisting even at the risk at being wrong, you force everybody to show their hand and sometimes they'll realize that they may be wrong or off point and that they need to reevaluate the situation

If this was more common, I think the world would start to become a much better place surprisingly quickly, at a cost of people suffering a little minor intellectual humiliation until they started to be more disciplined about their beliefs.

I feel similarly and agree about the responses. I typically avoid political arguments or heavily opinionated conversations. Maybe it's because I'm still young (I'll be 30 in a couple years) but I don't think this makes me an unenjoyable person to be around.

I like having _good_ conversations, and can still have them about controversial or opinionated subjects. If I don't know enough about a topic to offer my opinion I like to ask questions that will offer some insight as to why the person feels so strongly. Usually (not always) when someone feels very strongly about something, there is some kernel of truth somewhere that will at least be interesting. It's fun to at least figure out _why_ people think they way they do.

I used to have a bad habit of being a devil's advocate. I'm sure it was annoying when I was even younger, but I've found that faking (exploring) an opinion can help give the conversation some depth. Nowadays I do that less, but can get away with it if I preface it nicely enough.

This resonates with me to a surprising extent. My perceived threshold for expressing an opinion is very high, and I also find that I don't really have any particularly _strong_ opinions to begin with.

The "hedge my answers extensively" bit is spot-on, as is the isolating nature of this "trait", unfortunately.

I agree with all your points, especially (8) and (9). I think people who answer "no" to these questions because they lack self-awareness or because they are giving "right" answers instead of honest ones will far outnumber the people who have managed to completely eradicate their insecurity.

> Also (3) I don't get, because while I am extremely motivated by intellectual curiosity, I have maybe zero motivation to "develop my intelligence" like it was some kind of fitness thing.

Given the amount of cognitive bias each of us has, I'd say an important part of intellectual curiosity is making effort to learn to think better. I mean, a flat-Earther 9/11-truther astrologer could still claim to be primarily motivated by "intellectual curiosity".

The flat-Earther 9/11-truther astrologer probably really is primarily motivated by "intellectual curiosity", he probably just has poor priors. Which is to say, he's seeing that world as he's seeing it, it's just that something in his lower intellectual foundation is rotten.

The interesting question is whether that specific bit of rotten reasoning is still accessible to alteration after one has passed through that specific phase of neuroplasticity.

This test is aimed at the median of the population. However it could be altered slightly.

Answer yes or no AND write a short explanation of why.

Then the judge of the answer sheet should decide if points for or against are awarded for each question.

As an example, I just am really bad at complimenting others. Both because my own overall standards are so high and also because that was never a skill I learned; so I'm actually very shy at doing so. Maybe I should have been complimented more, and better trained as a child to compliment others.

I explained 6 in a different reply under this thread. However a different way of getting the data (which would be better and yield a clearer view) could be to ask: "If someone doesn't understand my idea what are the possible reasons?"

7) This one is just painful. It really depends on who you're exposed to on a daily basis and how you relate to them. I _have_ marveled at how smart, driven, or successful some others are... mostly the successful and driven parts though.

8/9) Emotional reactions are different from how you try to handle emotional reactions.

Alot of what has helped me evolve, is listening to HBR Ideacast podcasts.

There are alot of discussions which basically come down to how humans interact and communicate with one another, and what works and what doesn’t.

I noticed I compliment others quite a bit more since listening.

I would add some important evaluations. These are some less obvious, deeper aspects of intellectual humility:

10) I accept that someone with less experience may have better ideas than I have, even in my own field of expertise.

11) Even if I am not certain of myself, I am willing to suggest and defend my ideas because they deserve equal treatment.

12) I am willing to forgo new ideas when they hurt momentum too much.

13) I am willing to forgo momentum when the benefits of new ideas outweigh the costs.

14) When I feel it is right to assert my position, I am able and willing to back down if I receive feedback that changes my assumptions.

15) I know when to humbly defer decisions to the team even though I believe the team's decision is less than ideal. People are more important than problems to be solved.

>>10) I accept that someone with less experience may have better ideas than I have, even in my own field of expertise.

There are also people who assume their ideas in fields they don’t have experience in are good, precisely because of that lack of experience. They think their “outsider’s perspective” significantly increases their likelihood of being correct because they “think outside the box” or some such. It’s the opposite of humility, and supremely frustrating to deal with!

Care to explain the difference between 12 and 13?

12 is about recognizing when you're changing too quickly, 13 is about recognizing when you're changing too slowly. A lack of intellectual humility can impede you either way.

> Also (3) I don't get, because while I am extremely motivated by intellectual curiosity, I have maybe zero motivation to "develop my intelligence" like it was some kind of fitness thing.

It would be more apt to, if you were writing code that has some level of networking involved. During this you think "I don't remember/know much of the OSI model, so I should go read up on the model to better understand the code I am writing". Instead of just trying different things and adapting examples not understanding what it is actually doing.

That sounds as if trying to figure out on your own was antithetical to curiosity. That doesn't sound right to me.

I agree about not thinking about people being "smart" or not. I think everyone's interest just varies and sometimes their interests intersect with what people think of as "smart things".

One of my friends called me a genius the other day, but I'm just really nerdy about something that makes money. He's really into comics and is a walking encyclopedia of characters, timelines, stories and arcs, but wouldn't consider that "smart stuff", even though it is to me.

> Also (3) I don't get, because while I am extremely motivated by intellectual curiosity, I have maybe zero motivation to "develop my intelligence" like it was some kind of fitness thing.

I don't think of this in terms of intellectual fitness, but when I realise I made a wrong step in my modelling of the world I generally take a moment to reflect on where I went wrong and what I could do differently in the future to avoid similar pitfalls.

My problem lies in being open minded to hearing out someone who, after enough conversing, has an opinion that you’ve delved into deeply before and have seen the glaring shortcomings of, and when that individual is not open to those factual shortcomings.

That is- dealing with stubborn, close minded people, is incredibly difficult to stay open for me- in the best case I just move on.

> and when that individual is not open to those factual shortcomings.

That's when you should play the part of being stubborn and close-minded yourself, if this is what it takes to ensure that your points are heard. Intellectual humility is the best case, but sometimes it is best to cut one's losses.

>> and when that individual is not open to those factual shortcomings.

> That's when you should play the part of being stubborn and close-minded yourself, if this is what it takes to ensure that your points are heard.

Do you honestly believe that this is an effective technique in spreading your ideas?

While I cannot 100% agree with 0815test's statements (mainly because I don't see discussion as a win/lose battle, counting points, cutting losses...), there is in fact a certain motivation to take the stubborn position. When you look at the real world examples of people who successfully spread their ideas, unfortunately quite often there will be a certain degree of stubborness. It might be called different names - determination, believing in one's goals, but the effect is the same - at a certain point they will refuse to accept an alternative idea, even without any hard data. And by doing that, they might earn a social position that allows them to spread the ideas among many. Sometimes they even turn out to be right, sometimes not, but it was the aura of close-minded belief in themselves that brought them followers. Honestly, I'm a little disappointed that it works like this, because I would really prefer if deliberate polite factual discussion was always the norm.

I didn’t downvote you, but I also don’t agree with the methodology- it doesn’t seem conducive to progress.

Sounds to me like you enter conversations with a pre-made idea of what you want the conclusion to be.

Questions to ask yourself if you feel that way regularly:

Have you considered that various shortcomings might hold different weights to people depending on their background, experience in other adjacent domains, etc? That what is factual for you might not be so to others?

How do you know that your analysis of the shortcomings are correct/pertinent? That the person you're talking to hasn't delved in it as deeply as you have and just reached a different conclusion? Are you the close minded one for having decided early in the conversation that because you've thought about it in a certain way in the past, any interlocutor who thinks of it differently is necessarily wrong and stubborn?

Note how I said ‘after enough conversing‘.

I do give the benefit of the doubt for as long as I can. I admit to understanding positions that are premised on different values. I have a hard time when once I understand the values, inaccurate steps are taken to reach a false conclusion.

What I’m talking about is more akin to talking with someone making a mistake in a proof, being pointed out the mistake, but still digging their feet in to not admit the mistake.

I’m fine if assumptions aren’t shared, but not when conclusions don’t follow logically from assumptions.

Being open minded isn’t akin to listening to everything and anything- there are limits.

So no, it is not that ‘I enter conversations with a pre-made idea of what [I] want the conclusion to be.’

Actually, you likely do. You appear to expect rational self consistency.

Not all humans present that. They have reasons, some of which may just be their nature.

> Actually, you likely do.

Well sure everyone does, to some degree. But I thought dyarosla's clarification was quite sound, particularly this part: I admit to understanding positions that are premised on different values.

In my experience, a lot of people are completely ignorant of this important idea, that values (or axioms) are a crucially important part of disagreements, that someone may be approaching the same general topic from a very different perspective than you. Not only do some people not know/appreciate this, I've encountered several people who completely reject this idea if you point it out to them.

I am not judging on "sound", just pointing out that self consistency is the core exception.

That statement on "values", coupled with the other ones, all support strong self consistency.

How people evaluate things can, does, will vary from a highly rational POV.

Is logical consistency not a core tenant of a rational argument?

I’ll concede that some people don’t value logical consistency - but that doesn’t make them more rational in their arguments.

If there is subjectivity in a ‘logical inference’, I’ll err on the side of being open to it.

It absolutely is.

However, people are often not entirely rational creatures.

Advocacy, for a very effective example, is a combination of reason, emotion and character.

How people feel matters. Who they are interacting with and or referencing matters.

Roll all that up, and we are likely to encounter people who are not self consistent.

That is OK, human. I just noted that being a predetermination, that's all.

Secondly, there is no requirement they be more rational in their arguments. They may not even see something as one, depending on what it is.

They may, for example, seek better mutual understanding.

I readily affirm that feelings are most important, but it's pretty common to refuse to abandon one's feelings or one's facts and logic in the name of consistency.

It's not that someone can expect you to feel differently because they've presented a logical argument. That's not likely or expected.

Does any of that matter?

The OP said they did not predetermine, and I just pointed out that they do. (And I do not care)

No worries, just information.

Understanding others helps considerably when having conversations IMHO. My comments here speak to that.

Just know others may, or may not make the value judgements presented in this thread, that's all.

It is far more likely than you think. Consider a politically charged issue, some matter where religion is involved...

This all just is not the set piece implied.

I always think it is pretty neat when somebody responds, “I’ve never thought about it like that.”

> Also (3) I don't get, because while I am extremely motivated by intellectual curiosity, I have maybe zero motivation to "develop my intelligence" like it was some kind of fitness thing.

What's the difference between curiosity and a drive to develop your (crystallized) intelligence?

I mean I'm not driven to be "smarter", whatever that is. I am immersed in finding out more about everything that interests me.

Like I don't read to be well read. I don't listen to news to be informed. I read and listen out of my interests.

And during the process of learning what interests you, do you ever find that something tangentially related, you don't fully understand and should learn more about it.

I don't think anyone literally thinks, I need to know this to improve my intelligence as it is a weakness. It's usually more abstract.

Most of us are smart enough. Really, most things come down to doing the work, and doing it for reasons that make sense.

I feel like for 8 and 9, the right answer is actually that you are uncomfortable and don't like it.

The only people who would deny those things are phonies who aren't in touch with themselves. Accept it, acknowledge it, account for the bias it brings. Then maybe one could work on it.

You are assuming your reaction is the only legitimate reaction.

Some people like being uncomfortable because it motivates them.

Being comfortable for some people can lead to complacency.

> Also maybe I'm a wierdo but I don't think so much in terms of people being "smart", I think it is something you do.

Weirdo in a good way. Thanks for this one - sometimes I forget that thoughts/actions are smart, not people.

> When I was younger I was pretty painfully shy, so (4) I would not seek feedback, but not out of a lack of humility.

To fix such a things in a questionnaire there are 9 questions. Maximum score you could possible get is 9 times 7 = 63, but probably not many people would get so much. Even those who are super humble.

> Also (3) I don't get, because while I am extremely motivated by intellectual curiosity, I have maybe zero motivation to "develop my intelligence" like it was some kind of fitness thing.

So you do not reflect on your weaknesses in order to develop intelligence? Or you are doing it sometimes, when it is obvious for you that your task needs more intelligence from you? Maybe 3 as an answer would fit?

> I don't think that is really related to humility.

Good questionnaires are not like a random internet ones. There are special methods allowing to ensure that questionnaire is measuring what we want to measure, not something else. For example, you can measure intellectual humility based on the interviewing a participant, and then ask participant to fill a questionnaire with a 50 questions (or maybe 150, as much as your creativity could devise), that you think might be good. Get 50 participants, or maybe 100. The more is better, but it is a long and difficult task, to interview 100 people, and if you used a several PhD students as interviewers, than you need to control for interviewer also, because different people could get different results even when asking the same questions. So you would need even more participants to get a statistical significance. Number of questions itself also increases the number of data points needed.

After you gathered data, you would run it through R to find questions that are the best fit, to reduce questionnaire to bearable size. Probably after it you should test your new questionnaire by the same tactic you invented it. You even might need to do this, if at the first stage you got insufficient number of participants. But now you would need no factor analysis or something like, just a correlation would be enough. Or maybe chi-square.

I didn't read an article itself, but it is a published paper in a reviewed journal, so I bet it is done good, not just authors picked 9 questions on a random. Therefore I bet, that if you don't think that it is really related to humility, than you probably should change your mind and think the other way around. If it somehow important for you, I'd suggest to find a full text of paper describing methods used to devise a questionnaire and read them through. Maybe you are right after all. There might be a statistical mistakes, mistakenly used statistical methods for example, or some issues with the data gathering.