The Anosognosic's Dilemma: Something's Wrong but You'll Never Know What It Is (Part 1)
An in-depth look at stupidity and things that we do not know we don't know. The article is a first in a series by by Errol Morris. Although published several years ago, the series offers valuable insight into why we are the way we are.
Part 1 starts out with an interview of David Dunning, Cornell professor of social psychology. David Dunning is one-half of the Dunning-Kruger team that wrote the paper, "Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties of Recognizing Ones Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-assessments," was published in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 77(6), Dec 1999, 1121-1134. doi: 10.1037/0022-3514.77.6.1121. Dunning and Kruger state in their paper:
When people are incompetent in the strategies they adopt to achieve success and satisfaction, they suffer a dual burden: Not only do they reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the ability to realize it. Instead, . . . they are left with the erroneous impression they are doing just fine.
In other words, those who are incompetent are unable to recognize their own incompetence.