Scott Adams (who I'm not particularly fond of) has a habit of saying that people pick mental models that 1) make sense of reality (sometimes in a misperceived w

Scott Adams (who I'm not particularly fond of) has a habit of saying that people pick mental models that 1) make sense of reality (sometimes in a misperceived way) and 2) make them happy. That does seem to explain a lot about human behavior, but I don't necessarily think people are deliberately ignoring reality, just making sense of it in an illogical way sometimes.