Cognitively Yours 1.27

Raja R, Author

"The mere act of classification reinforces stereotypes, if you want to weaken some stereotype, eliminate the classification"

We tend to compare things, and judge their similarity. We essentially make a list of features. These features are simply what they notice about the objects. We count-up the noticeable features shared by two objects. The more we share, the more similar they are.

Let us imagine these three scenarios and how we make the decision based on these three scenarios.

1. We have a financial goal say building a nest egg for retirement planning and we have a financial plan to achieve the goal based on asset allocation. Now, while comparing the categories for investment we come across a category “tax saving schemes” which is a heterogeneous one consisting of instruments of various asset classes. Savings on tax does help you in achieving your financial goal fast, but limiting your choices to the category and overlooking the asset allocation could prove tricky.

2. Categorisation of schemes as retirement schemes, child savings schemes may make you not to look beyond these categories for those specific needs.

3. When a cricket team is formed, selectors tend to have a template fixed as six batsmen, an all-rounder and four bowlers. This template overlooks the possibility that an all-rounder can be better than a batsman in batting and limits the number of all-rounders.

Amos who has authored a paper on this subject “Features of Similarity” was once asked “What about a three-legged dog? Two three-legged are obviously more similar to each other than a three-legged dog is to a four-legged dog. Yet a three-legged dog shares exactly the same number of features with a four-legged dog, as it does with a three-legged dog”. Amos quipped “The absence of a feature is a feature”.

He added, “Similarity increases with the addition of common features and/or deletion of distinctive features.

When people make decisions, they are also making judgments about similarity, between some object in the real world and what they ideally want. They make these judgments by, in effect, counting-up the features they notice. And as the notice-ability of features can be manipulated by the way they are highlighted, the sense of how similar two things are, might also be manipulated. For instance, if you wanted two people to think of themselves as more similar to each other than otherwise they might, you might put them in a context that stressed the features they shared. Two Indian college students in India might look at each other and see a total stranger; the same two college students on their study abroad in an American University might find that they are surprisingly similar. They are both Indians.

By changing the context in which two things are compared, you submerge certain features and force others to the surface. It is generally assumed that classifications are determined by similarities among the objects. Amos view is that the similarity of objects is modified by the manner in which they are classified. Thus, similarity has two faces: casual and derivative. It serves as a basis for the classification of objects, but is also influenced by the adopted classification.

A banana and an apple seem more similar than they otherwise would because we have agreed to call them both fruit. Things are grouped together for a reason, but, once they are grouped, their grouping causes them to seem more like each other than they otherwise would. That is, the mere act of classification reinforces stereotypes, if you want to weaken some stereotype, eliminate the classification.

A metaphor/ simile is a figure of speech that describes an object or action in a way that isn’t literally true, but helps explain an idea or make a comparison. There is a close tie between the assessment of similarity and the interpretation of metaphors. In judgments of similarity, one assumes a particular feature space, or a frame of reference, and assess the quality of the match between the subject and the referent. In the interpretation of similes, one assumes a resemblance between the subject and the referent and searches for an interpretation of space that would maximise the quality of the match.

In short, the same pair of objects therefore can be viewed as similar or different depending on the choice of a frame of reference.

Reference: Feature of similarity by Amos Tversky

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