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Childhood trauma makes adults gullible?
May 27, 2006 4:28 PM   RSS feed for this thread Subscribe

Graduates of the "school of hard knocks" flunk real life.A study from the University of Leicester says that, contrary to popular expectation, unpleasant and traumatic life experiences don't make people suspicious and shrewd -- quite the opposite. Many people who've had a tough life actually turn out more gullible and easily swayed:
"This is because the person may have learned to distrust their actions, judgments and decisions due to the fact that the majority of the time their actions have been perceived to invite negative consequences"
The counter-intuitiveness of this finding fascinates me. Wait. Maybe I shouldn't be taking it at face value...
posted by AmbroseChapel (50 comments total) 3 users marked this as a favorite

Am I missing something (possible, I only scanned the article and did not read it carefully), but did they fail to heed the "correlation is not causation" rule? Particularly, the first thing that comes strongly to my mind is whether it was corrected for economic class. Surely the lower economic classes are more likely to face all sorts of personal adversities while, at the same time, their lower economic status may be the chief factor that truly is causal to a relatively lower ability to make good decisions and trust their own judgment. And, good grief, wouldn't this especially be true of something like confidence and susceptibility to persuasion in a police interrogation?
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 4:38 PM on May 27, 2006


In addition to Ethereal's concern, 60 participants seems like a pretty small sample. Also, there's not much explanation of their methodology. How did they compare the relative adversity of different people's life events? How does parental divorce compare with being bullied at school or getting laid off?
posted by justkevin at 4:48 PM on May 27, 2006


Weird. People with low self-esteem don't do well in life? Go figure. /asshole derail

Seriously, EB and justkevin raise some pretty good points. I don't necessarily see these results as being counter-intuitive, but the study is suspect.
posted by psmealey at 4:59 PM on May 27, 2006


did they fail to heed the "correlation is not causation" rule?

The existance of correlation is still notable.
posted by Space Coyote at 5:00 PM on May 27, 2006


I think both the study and the popular perception of trauma-creating-wisdom show too many assumptions.

Wisdom, shrewdness, ingenuity, and related ideals are things that are almost always defined in hindsight, often by people giving credit for things that turn out to have a large luck component. Both distrust and trust for your fellow human beings can be regarded as virtues in different circumstances, and the ones you get are determined largely by chance, the environments you choose you insert yourself into, your own personal goals, and your outlook on the world.

I observe that many people who are successful in business are ultimately as unhappy as those who scrape by, and those who are both successful (financially) and happy are sometimes among the most deluded, morally deficient people you could hope to meet.
posted by JHarris at 5:06 PM on May 27, 2006


The actual paper is going to be presented in mid-June, so the details aren't there.

IANAPsychologist of course. I'm interested in it just because of that "contrary to popular expectation" thing.

If I'd asked "who's more skeptical -- people who've led peaceful, happy lives, or people who've been hurt and disappointed a lot?", what would you have said, off the top of your head?
posted by AmbroseChapel at 5:12 PM on May 27, 2006


If you phrased it "who's more likely to have stronger hungers that could lead them to make poor decisions -- people who've led peaceful, happy lives, or people who've been hurt and disappointed a lot?", I think it's easier to see why hurt people could sometimes be more gullible. Especially if they're still hoping their ship will come in, rather than being complete cynics.
posted by weston at 6:37 PM on May 27, 2006


Yeah, I immediately wonder about the reverse causation: if you're a little less suspicious, a little more gullible, this might well lead to a life with more "hard knocks" than another.
posted by hattifattener at 6:38 PM on May 27, 2006


I don't think that skeptical equates to cynical, which is what I think is the primary result of hardship to a temperment prone to moving in that direction.

Skepticism? That's a trained, intellectual habit that very few people possess of whatever difficult or cushy background.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 6:40 PM on May 27, 2006


EB: are you saying that low economic status is not an "unpleasant experience."

I guess what you're saying is: gullible people are more likely to be poor, and poor people are more likely to suffer hardships. When I first read what you said, it sounded as if you were saying that being poor caused people to be gullible, which didn't make any sense at all.

Weird. People with low self-esteem don't do well in life? Go figure. /asshole derail

First of all this study has nothing to do with self-esteem.

Second of all, self-esteem has nothing to do with success in life. People in prison, on average, esteem themselves as highly as people outside of prison (for example)

Seriously, where did you get self-esteem out of any of this?
posted by delmoi at 6:52 PM on May 27, 2006


Am I missing something (possible, I only scanned the article and did not read it carefully), but did they fail to heed the "correlation is not causation" rule?

Also the rule is "correlation does not imply causation", not "correlation is not causation"

Obviously causes correlate to their effects.

There are two causal relationships that we've though of in this thread:

Hardships make people more gullible -- and
Gullibility causes economic hardship, which causes general hardship.

Secondly, there's this:

People who have suffered life's hard knocks while growing up tend to be more gullible than those who have been more sheltered, startling new findings from the University of Leicester reveal.

No normally, if two things are correlated, and one thing happens before the other, it's reasonable to assume that the first caused the later, not the other way around. In today's society, the economic status of the child while they are a child is dependant on the economic status of the parent.

I'm sure you guys are not saying that a child's over-all gullibility effects the parents economic status, so you must mean that gullibility is actually hereditary.

So the two theories are actually:

Childhood hardships make people more gullible
Gullibility is hereditary, and if children are gullible, their parents were also gullible and were therefore poor, and therefore had more family hardships.

Anyway, that's getting a little absurd, as you can see. Also, I don't really think being gullible is really that much of an impediment to being wealthy, at least in this country, because commerce is regulated and lies are not permitted. It's still possible to be scammed, but I don't think the effect is really that great.
posted by delmoi at 7:01 PM on May 27, 2006


There are few things as reliable as MeFi's ability to nitpick research methodology after "only scann[ing] the article."
posted by aaronetc at 7:11 PM on May 27, 2006


"I guess what you're saying is: gullible people are more likely to be poor, and poor people are more likely to suffer hardships. When I first read what you said, it sounded as if you were saying that being poor caused people to be gullible, which didn't make any sense at all. "

No, what I'm suggesting (not asserting as fact) is that poor people are likely to suffer hardships and that poor people are likely to be gullible and that in both instances it is being poor that is causal to the other. Being poor is the cause here; the relationship between being gullible and suffering hardship is a correlation.

Now, obviously (lest someone jump on me about this), it certainly must be the case that certain attributes, perhaps including gullability, are also causally related to being poor. Probably being somewhat below average in intelligence, if you believe in such a thing, is quite likely to have a moderate (not absolute or even strong, I'd say) causal relationship to being poor.

Even so, as I've grown older I've become more convinced that there are a number of structural reasons that poor people remain poor and thus I find in this article an almost willfull (and perhaps very conservative) denial of the simple possibility that poverty is at the root of much of this, not just the random contingencies of growing up.

There is a sensibility behind this paper that makes me suspicious, obviously. And it doesn't encourage me to be confident in phsychology research.

But then, as is so often true, this is a news report of a research finding. Journalists get a great many things completely wrong when covering science. Sadly.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 7:21 PM on May 27, 2006


How can poverty cause gullibility? Simply by getting a poor education?

Even so, as I've grown older I've become more convinced that there are a number of structural reasons that poor people remain poor and thus I find in this article an almost willfull (and perhaps very conservative) denial of the simple possibility that poverty is at the root of much of this, not just the random contingencies of growing up.

Well, the paper didn't even deal with poverty at all, and you're just making up a causal link between being poor as a child and being gullible as an adult. Unless you're saying that being poor causes hardships, and that hardship causes gullibility, in which case you are agreeing with the original author.

Remember, we're talking about childhood trauma, certainly nothing in their adult lives can affect their childhood.

Your basic criticism seems to be that they havn't used this paper as a platform to bash poor people for no reason.
posted by delmoi at 8:32 PM on May 27, 2006


I think you're badly misreading me.

I'm saying that they looked at people who had hardships as children and found that it correlated with those people being gullible as adults. Then they postulate a causal relationship: hardships cause gullibility.

I'm saying that poverty causes gullibility. It also causes hardships. Hardships and gullibility have no causal relationship. This isn't that damn complicated, delmoi. I'm beginning to see why you fuck up so many physics questions in AskMe.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 8:48 PM on May 27, 2006


"How can poverty cause gullibility? Simply by getting a poor education?"

"Simply"? If we assume, which by the way this author is, that gullibility is an aquired trait (or that its opposite is), then let's think about all the things are involved in learning how not to be gullible. Formal education, certainly. Both length and quality of the education. Both of which negatively correlate with poverty. But also wide-ranging experience. Which poverty inhibits. Also the informal education provided by parents, who are likely to have also grown up poor, received poor and limited educations.

It's hard to overestimate how much structural poverty is a trap for the poor. How in the fuck you think I'm "bashing the poor" is beyond me. I'm saying that the poor face a great many hardships through no fault of their own and many of those hardships are the hardships this author was looking at. And also because they are poor, they do not have the education and opportunities and experience to aquire the skills the researcher is assuming is causally related to a lack of hardships. There's a big, fucking elephant in the room in this whole argument, and these researchers are ignoring it. They're looking for all sorts of random reasons why some people are unsually stupid and gullible, finding hardship, and never wondering if the same thing is causing the gullibility and hardship.

But the real paper could be a great deal more sophisticated and the news article very distorting or false. Hopefully.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 8:57 PM on May 27, 2006


Furthermore, if my view is correct, you can imagine that highly successful, in these terms (which probably are very close to some others) people who come from poverty will be the outliers among their cohorts and yet, being more visible among those who are also high-achieving, will be seen as representative of their cohorts. If they can do it, why can't everyone else? That's always been a bad argument, it's still a bad argument, and it's a narrow-sighted and heartless argument.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 9:01 PM on May 27, 2006


I'm sorry, I'm being a prick. It just really pissed me off that you'd get my argument so wrong that you thought I was "bashing poor people".
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 9:04 PM on May 27, 2006


I've seen my mother suffer through this her entire life. I also distrust my own judgment far more than I should due to a lot of negative childhood events. I've worked really hard to unlearn my lack of own trust in my judgment. At least from my own experience, this article hits home.
posted by Ironmouth at 10:02 PM on May 27, 2006


Hate to cut into the arguments above, but of course, those arguing poverty as a cause don't see the counter argument--that those in poverty have more adverse childhood events and therefore are more gullible. That is to say that the effect described in the paper could be the very cause of the "acquired trait" referred to above.
posted by Ironmouth at 10:05 PM on May 27, 2006


this is a news report of a research finding

Technically, it's a media release from the publicity department of an academic institution designed to promote a forthcoming paper.

This story was picked up, for some reason, by Indian papers far more than European/North American ones. Unless that's just some glitch in Google News or in the way UPI articles percolate through Indian news media.

Two points about the poverty thing:

Perhaps it's just about unlucky people.
posted by AmbroseChapel at 10:07 PM on May 27, 2006


To make myself a bit clearer, those making the poverty argument do not understand the argument made by the researchers, namely that hardships can cause a lack of trust in one's judgment. The authors make no statement on what the causes of those hardships might be. Therefore, any counter argument asserting that poverty might be an alternative cause to gullibility are arguing past the paper. I see poverty as a huge cause of hardships and this paper laying out a plausible reason why poverty and gullibility go together.
posted by Ironmouth at 10:09 PM on May 27, 2006


Ambrose, I'd suspect that those things happen to those in poverty at a higher rate than those with wealth.
posted by Ironmouth at 10:10 PM on May 27, 2006


AmbroseChapel, thank you for your post, this subject is very interesting to me and I've given it a lot of thought over the years. I happen to agree with the premise of the article.

In recovering from an abusive childhood, I also was interested in my own capacity for being repeatedly duped since I grew up in the school of hard knocks while living among the wealthy, a more frequent combo than one would imagine. My blindness or getting caught up in a cycle of abuse made no sense to me and I set out to find answers.

Here are a handful of thoughts on the subject:

Patrick Carnes thinks being duped over and over is a neurochemical addiction, arising out of what he calls a betrayal bond, which prompts the person to repeat being victimised by exploitative relationships.

He says: "Exploitive relationships can create trauma bonds-chains that link a victim to someone who is dangerous to them. Divorce, employee relations, litigation of any type, incest and child abuse, family and marital systems, domestic violence, hostage negotiations, kidnapping, professional exploitation and religious abuse are all areas of trauma bonding. All these relationships share one thing: they are situations of incredible intensity or importance where there is an exploitation of trust or power."

That's one take on the repetition compulsion of returning to dramarama.

I asked this same question in an online psychoanalytic group: Object-Relations. My question was, could repeated naivete be a type of defense mechanism? And a couple of psychologists there said yes, inappropriate naivete can be a way of not being able to see the badness of a parental abuser as part of a bigger picture in which both good and bad are included; the bad isn't seen and only good is seen.

Sam Vaknin, who has authored many articles about pathological narcissism, scathingly calls inappropriate naivete "the malignant optimism of the abused".

There is an interesting paper on different types of psychopathy, primary and secondary. He theorizes that secondary psychopathy is in part based on the hard knocks of poverty: "In Mealey's terminology primary sociopaths are biologically contraprepared to learn empathy and consequently demonstrate psychopathic behaviour at an early stage, whereas secondary sociopaths encounter a combination of risk factors such as a large number of siblings, low socio-economic status, urban residency, low intelligence and poor social skills. These variables contribute to the development of secondary sociopathy in a two stage process involving initially parental neglect, abuse, inconsistent discipline, and punishment as opposed to rewards. In the second stage children may be at a social disadvantage because of poor social skills and may therefore interact primarily with a peer group comprised other unskilled individuals, including primary sociopaths."

In brief, what helped me the most in my particular wising up was to learn that being hurt had/has an impact, it's not something that has no residue; I studied the dynamics of family psychology and then the personality disorders of various abusers, so that I could 'see' the people I had been blind to before; learning to know how I had been hurt and feel the formerly suppressed feelings; listen to cues which arise because of my feelings and learn appropriate actions to take; work on healthier self-esteem and move forward to have a healthier life making better choices.
posted by nickyskye at 10:16 PM on May 27, 2006


SO therefore all Metifites have had an easy-life childood since everyone here knows 100% that they're always right.
posted by HTuttle at 10:59 PM on May 27, 2006


Also, I don't really think being gullible is really that much of an impediment to being wealthy, at least in this country, because commerce is regulated and lies are not permitted.

Hee hee hee hee hee.

Okay, now that I've done that: I find it really amusing how often the first comment on links to "a study shows" posts seem to almost always be asking if the researchers have considered the fact that correlation isn't causation. Considering how many Metafilter users love to go off on this, I have to imagine that professional psychological researchers must have heard of it, too, and probably wrote it down somewhere.

That being said, I think EB's hit upon an important point. Gullibility, at least as far as I can tell, arises due to a lack of context or experience with active criticism. In order to function in modern society, it's pretty much essential to be able to deconstruct what people are telling you and be able to consider why they might want to tell you that, not just what they're saying. As active participants in (mostly) intelligent discourse, the average Metafilter user might think of this as ridiculously obvious, but it isn't—critical thinking is a complex, acquired skill, and it's not just about writing critiques of classical philosophy.

When you're poor, when everything is going to shit and you're just trying to figure out how you're going to stretch your groceries through the next couple of weeks so hopefully you can make it to your next paycheque, if you even have a job -- you don't really have time to sit around contemplating motivations. Or if you do have time, it's so far down your list of things to worry about that you never get to it. Children in poverty may be discouraged from making their own decisions (Jenny doesn't get to have any input in what to have for supper if there's only one thing to eat), and they might also feel guilty/bad about questioning their life situation—discussing it doesn't change it, and it tends to make everyone involve feel worse about it. There are all sorts of situations like this, associated with having a crappy life, that might end up making children less likely to question authority and motivation, and accepting of face value.

Of course, there are exceptions—my parents were not very well off at all, got divorced, etc., and now I'm here writing incredibly long comments on this here Internet thing. I think this one's long enough, though! Good link, Ambrose, it's an important topic. Poverty & hardship hits you in more places than just the stomach and the wardrobe, for sure.
posted by blacklite at 11:51 PM on May 27, 2006


Have I mentioned how much I like the em-dash? It's pretty easy to make (—) and it makes everything so nice and literary—if you're into that sort of thing. :D
posted by blacklite at 11:54 PM on May 27, 2006


Also, it seems to me that there are lots of very gullible, yet very wealthy people out there. Most of the Neo-Cons for example (not to make this political, or anything :P)
posted by delmoi at 12:02 AM on May 28, 2006


I'd like to know if the primary/secondary psychopath dynamic could be interpreted as meaning a primary psychopathic parent could produce a secondary psychopathic 'echo child'.

Having been raised by one, possibly two of the fuckers, I have noticed certain psychopathic traits in myself - basically included in my diagnosis as a borderline - and often wondered why such an 'echo' wouldn't be a perfectly reasonable response in a child's identity to being malformed in the presence of psychopathy.

I'm perfectly capable of empathy. But I'm just as capable of shutting it off should I deem it necessary. Good thing I'm not Emperor then, I suppose.
posted by moneyjane at 12:10 AM on May 28, 2006


I'm sorry, I'm being a prick. It just really pissed me off that you'd get my argument so wrong that you thought I was "bashing poor people".

Well, sorry about that. But the only thing I could get from what your were saying was that "Poverty causes gullibility" directly, rather then the more obvious "Poverty -> Hardships -> Gullibility" which is not a statement that disagrees with the researchers, but rather builds upon it.

The other factors, such as formal (and informal) education seem less likely to cause gullibility.

It would be interesting to see if they corrected their results for education levels, and for pure intelligence, as well as for poverty.

SO therefore all Metifites have had an easy-life childood since everyone here knows 100% that they're always right.

Bwahahahaha.
posted by delmoi at 12:16 AM on May 28, 2006


Poverty is relative to wealth. Poor people are poor because they aren't wealthy, and for no other reason, whether they were duped into poverty by the wealthy or not. To say they are poor because... implies enough to fill a utopian encyclopedia, including the idea that equality is an average, or that wealth is normal, which are delusions related to the poor and gullible.
posted by Brian B. at 12:30 AM on May 28, 2006


I just wish the university of leicester could spell "misled" - past tense and past participle of mislead - instead od substituting "mislead" - transitive verb : to lead into a mistaken action or belief : to cause to have a false impression intransitive verb : to create a false impression
posted by terrymiles at 12:39 AM on May 28, 2006


Poverty can cause a person to be willing to try anything to relieve their destitution.
posted by Goofyy at 1:07 AM on May 28, 2006


Powerlessness often = gullibility.

Poor people are often very close to powerless.

Knowledge is power.

But childhood trauma?

No...not gullible. Suspicious. Jaded. A loner.

Trauma is something that knocks you on your ass.

It might make you many things, but not gullible.
posted by rougy at 1:29 AM on May 28, 2006


article:

"A six-month study in the University's School of Psychology found...."

Six...fucking...months....

University of Leister?

I guess they give their graduates tee-shirts, no?

And maybe a bowl of soup?
posted by rougy at 1:40 AM on May 28, 2006


article -

"The research analysing results from 60 participants...."

Well - I apologize - for a minute I thought that they might have included too few people in their study....
posted by rougy at 1:58 AM on May 28, 2006


May I just add another anecdotal confirmation of the study's conclusions? Without boring you with my personal details?

After many years of consideration similar to that of nickyskye, I would say that there may be a propensity for "trauma = gullibility." However, trauma interacts with other, perhaps hard-wired, psychological traits, and with varied life situations. We may end up with a short generalized list of possible personality tendencies which result from childhood trauma, one of which is gullibility.

AmbroseChapel, it is indeed counter-intuitive, and difficult to understand. I think this is evident when considering, for instance, women who do not leave an abusive partner, or who go from one abuser to the next. It seems confounding to many people, and the woman is frequently judged harshly. But it's a good example of the study's conclusions, and of the power of distrusting one's own judgement. Think of it this way: a difficult and deeply emotional life experience can derail anyone's critical thinking skills, at least for a time. If a person's life experience is chronically difficult, that person may never be able to effectively employ critical thinking to his or her own situation.
posted by shifafa at 8:29 AM on May 28, 2006


I haven't much to add beyond that this article has made me feel ... validated.
posted by The Great Big Mulp at 8:56 AM on May 28, 2006


Just a little bit.
posted by The Great Big Mulp at 8:56 AM on May 28, 2006


This is paradoxical--and interesting.

Perhaps graduates of the school of hard knocks have mainly learned to submit to the will of those who can knock the hardest. From this point of view, what researchers have stigmatized as 'gullibility' appears instead as the best way to achieve this submission with a minimum of physical and psychological harm.
posted by jamjam at 9:34 AM on May 28, 2006


I can't believe it- 40 comments without a single Daddy Warbucks joke.
posted by overanxious ducksqueezer at 10:25 AM on May 28, 2006


It took me some digging, but it appears that the real title of the paper is The Influence of Life Events on Interrogative Suggestibility. There is no PDF of the paper on the Internet, but it was probably done through psychology experiments that replicate an interrogation setting. The press release from Leicester University does mention police interrogations, but it appears the press release goes a little far in expanding the implications of the paper outside of the police interrogation setting. The moral is that you shouldn't judge a researcher based on what their university press releases say.
posted by jonp72 at 12:46 PM on May 28, 2006


Seriously, where did you get self-esteem out of any of this?

Delmoi, it was mostly a flippant comment and a poor choice of words (I was half in the bag when I wrote it). I really meant self-confidence, rather than self-esteem. My issue was with the original poster, who framed the conclusion as counter-intuitive.

Having endured a couple of traumatic events in my life (similar to those mentioned in the study), in both instances I came through it intact, but with shaken self-confidence. I can speak only for myself, but when my self-confidence is diminished, I notice that I am more vulnerable to being "screwed with" or even duped. So, I didn't think the analysis or result of the study was counter-intuitive at all. To me it was completely logical.
posted by psmealey at 1:18 PM on May 28, 2006


Death to all bullies.
posted by modernerd at 3:46 PM on May 28, 2006


shifafa, Thanks for the anecdotal validation, sorry if I was boring.

There are other psychological studies about the impact of trauma on interrogative suggestibility.

"The original application of this research was the police interrogation setting, the implications being that people who've experienced a high number of life adversities may be more prone to falsely confessing due to being highly suggestible, possibly resulting in a greater chance of being wrongly convicted."

The far-reaching explorations will be interesting to follow: "However, the notion of suggestibility falls far beyond that of forensic psychology. People may find they are more easily influenced by the media, by TV adverts and so may make life choices as a result that they otherwise would not... "

I've often found that professors with a focus on forensic psychology, such as Dr Julian Boon and Ray Bull, mentioned in the original article, do intriguing research on trauma and abuse.
posted by nickyskye at 5:23 PM on May 28, 2006


There is no PDF of the paper on the Internet

It's to be presented at a conference on June the 13th -- when every enlightened person in the world will be obsessing about the World Cup.

Someone put a reminder in their diary for the follow-up?
posted by AmbroseChapel at 6:44 PM on May 28, 2006


About the education debate, this was in the WaPo today:
Even Smarties Get Swindled On The Net

There were no deep insights in the article but a good nugget of advice for all of us:

Rich Siegel has a word of advice. "No one is going to give you $12 million. . . . You don't have a long-lost uncle who died in a car accident on Sagbama Road in the jungles of Nigeria. You never purchased the winning ticket in a Sub-Saharan international lottery," he writes on his Web site.
posted by overanxious ducksqueezer at 9:39 PM on May 28, 2006


Nickyskye - you weren't boring at all. However, I would be. ;-)
posted by shifafa at 9:30 AM on May 29, 2006


No, I don't think so shifafa. :)
posted by nickyskye at 8:36 PM on May 29, 2006


Coerced confessions: corporations are following police interrogation training manuals.

The more we learn about widespread interrogation tactics, the more we realize that the decision to confess falsely can be rational -- a mistake, to be sure, but the product of an understandable cost-benefit analysis made under extreme circumstances – circumstances created by interrogators precisely to make the suspect feel hopeless.

The truth about false confessions
posted by overanxious ducksqueezer at 7:24 PM on June 7, 2006


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