"No one enjoys being wrong. It’s an unpleasant emotional experience for all of us," psychologist Guy Winch, Ph.D., said. "The question is how do we respond when it turns out we were wrong—when there wasn’t enough milk left for coffee, when we hit traffic and missed the flight, or when we find out the man who sat in jail for five years based on our identification was innocent all along?"
"Some of us admit we were wrong and say, 'Oops, you were right. We should have gotten more milk.' Some of us kind of imply we were wrong, but we don't do so explicitly or in a way that is satisfying to the other person: 'We had plenty of time to get to the airport on time if the traffic hadn’t been unusually bad. But fine, we’ll leave earlier next time.'"
"But some people refuse to admit they're wrong, even in the face of overwhelming evidence: 'They let him go because of DNA evidence and another dude's confession? Ridiculous! That’s the guy! I saw him!'"
Winch thinks that when a person pushes back against the facts, when they simply cannot admit that they were wrong in any circumstance, everything boils down to their ego. Their sense of self.
"Some people have such a fragile ego, such brittle self-esteem, such a weak 'psychological constitution,' that admitting they made a mistake or that they were wrong is fundamentally too threatening for their egos to tolerate," the psychologist said.
These people can't admit they're wrong, so their defense mechanisms do something remarkable to avoid it. They literally distort their perception of reality to make it (reality) less threatening.
"Their defense mechanisms protect their fragile ego by changing the very facts in their mind, so they are no longer wrong or culpable," Winch said.
"As a result, they come up with statements, such as, 'I checked in the morning, and there was enough milk, so someone must have finished it.'"
Usually, when it's pointed out that they don't see things as they are, these people double down. "In our ... example, they will insist that their erroneous identification of the robber was correct despite DNA evidence and a confession from a different person."
"When confronted, they will continue to insist or pivot to attacking anyone who tries to argue otherwise and to disparage the sources of the contradictory information."
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People who repeatedly resort to this kind of behavior are, by definition, psychologically fragile. And they don't like it.
"[Such an] assessment is often difficult for people to accept, because to the outside world, they look as if they're confidently standing their ground and not backing down, things we associate with strength. But psychological rigidity is not a sign of strength, it is an indication of weakness," Winch highlighted.
