Overconfidence & Calibration
category
The overconfidence effect is the systematically demonstrated tendency of humans to overestimate the accuracy of their own knowledge and the probability that their predictions will be correct — with studies consistently showing that when people say they are '90% certain', they are correct only 70–75% of the time, and that experts are frequently more overconfident in their domains than informed laypeople.
Role
Calibration — the alignment of confidence with actual accuracy — is a learnable skill and one of the most powerful predictors of decision-making quality identified by superforecasting research. The majority of people have never been taught that confidence and correctness are separable, or that the subjective feeling of certainty is not evidence of accuracy. This gap produces an epidemic of overconfident decisions in every domain of life, from investments to relationships to medical choices.
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