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This is spot on. This psychological barrier is probably the number one obstacle to a wider recognition of the existence and extent of this problem. People like

This is spot on. This psychological barrier is probably the number one obstacle to a wider recognition of the existence and extent of this problem. People like me who challenge the science behind the diagnoses of SBS face an absolutely unprecedented and unreasonable pushback, like I've never seen in any other area. Basically everyone who has worked on this side has faced threats, insults, personal attacks, cancellations, boycotts, and so on. The "cognitive bias" you mention (does it have a name? perhaps cognitive dissonance?) is a likely reason for this amount of antagonism.

mabcat 3y ago
Closest name I can think of is "commitment and consistency". People tend to behave as they have behaved in the past, doing so is both a cognitive shortcut and a source of positive emotion. We go to great lengths to maintain consistency (see also: confirmation bias), and being consistent even in the face of conflicting evidence feels better than being inconsistent but right. From Cialdini: "Once we have made a choice or taken a stand, we will encounter personal and interpersonal pressures to behave consistently with that commitment. Those pressures will cause us to respond in ways that justify our earlier decision."
- hn_version_0023 3y ago
  In my head -- and I'm no doctor, believe you me! -- I call this "emotional inertia", which is a phrase I've borrowed from one of the many doctors who has treated me for depression.
gwd 3y ago
It certainly would be a form of cognitive dissonance, but that's much more general; I experienced cognitive dissonance hearing the word "nicht" pronounced by a native German speaker yesterday evening, because it wasn't at all like what I expected it to sound like. "Confirmation bias", where you tend to see what you expect to see, is narrower; but still I think doesn't capture what we're talking about. We're specifically talking about resistance to accepting the idea because accepting it would mean reclassifying actions you yourself had taken from "very good" to "very bad". It's kind of weird that it doesn't have a name -- I'm convinced it plays a pretty big part of human behavior, much more than is commonly acknowledged.
- rossant 3y ago
  > We're specifically talking about resistance to accepting the idea because accepting it would mean reclassifying actions you yourself had taken from "very good" to "very bad". That's exactly it. I'd love to discover scientific literature about this phenomenon, and I'd also be surprised if it doesn't already have a name and an extensive literature. But if that's the case: I think there are research carriers in psychology to make here... Edit: ChatGPT found "belief perseverance" [1] but, again, that's not exactly what we're talking about, which also relates to a personal sense of morality and "being one of the good guys". [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief_perseverance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief_perseverance
  - gwd 3y ago
    You could call it "moral self-image maintenance bias": A bias towards maintaining your self-image as an upright, moral person.
    - tivert 3y ago
      I think it's probably just a kind of "avoidance" or "denial." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experiential_avoidance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experiential_avoidance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial_(Freud) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial_(Freud) HN and software engineers have bias to over-focus on the cognitive, but I think the key experience here is emotional distress.
      - rossant 3y ago
        I agree. It's kind of ironic you mention "denial". It turns out this is one of the favorite attacks by "SBS proponents" against those who challenge the scientific reliability of the diagnosis. We are called "denialists" and we're accused of "denying the existence of child abuse" (?). Parents in my organization (Adikia) who face false allegations of abuse are said to be in "denial" of their own abusive behavior. This story line appears to be quite credible and powerful within the medical and judicial communities. Here's one among thousands of examples, from a really terrible paper by one such powerful SBS proponent here in France [1] (another of his papers was actually retracted this year [2]). "Fake news 11: the caretakers’ denial is sincere Clinicians and defenders can become intoxicated by the denials of parents suffering the agony of having their child in dire condition, and at the same time being grilled for their possible responsibility. The mental mechanisms of self-denial are well-known to psychiatrists. A perpetrator, after a violent burst, and faced with its terrible consequences, can experience a dissociation mechanism similar to witnesses of catastrophes, dissociation being understood as “a break between the memory, the perception, the consciousness and the identity…when faced with unbearable feelings”. Sincere denial easily elicits compassion from the medical staff as well as defenders, a natural response which is enhanced by professional training. Some authors have documented with functional imaging the sincerity of denial in a case of convicted child abuse and concluded that the sincerity of denial is not a criterion for innocence." [1] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00381-021-05357-8 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00381-021-05357-8 [2] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00381-023-05889-1 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00381-023-05889-1
alexashka 3y ago
It's the sunk cost fallacy. This is why Max Planch (German physicist) has quipped that science advances one funeral at a time.
- Summershard 3y ago
  I think the related term, the escalation of commitment, suits this better.

mabcat 3y ago

Closest name I can think of is "commitment and consistency". People tend to behave as they have behaved in the past, doing so is both a cognitive shortcut and a source of positive emotion. We go to great lengths to maintain consistency (see also: confirmation bias), and being consistent even in the face of conflicting evidence feels better than being inconsistent but right. From Cialdini: "Once we have made a choice or taken a stand, we will encounter personal and interpersonal pressures to behave consistently with that commitment. Those pressures will cause us to respond in ways that justify our earlier decision."

hn_version_0023 3y ago
In my head -- and I'm no doctor, believe you me! -- I call this "emotional inertia", which is a phrase I've borrowed from one of the many doctors who has treated me for depression.

gwd 3y ago

It certainly would be a form of cognitive dissonance, but that's much more general; I experienced cognitive dissonance hearing the word "nicht" pronounced by a native German speaker yesterday evening, because it wasn't at all like what I expected it to sound like. "Confirmation bias", where you tend to see what you expect to see, is narrower; but still I think doesn't capture what we're talking about. We're specifically talking about resistance to accepting the idea because accepting it would mean reclassifying actions you yourself had taken from "very good" to "very bad". It's kind of weird that it doesn't have a name -- I'm convinced it plays a pretty big part of human behavior, much more than is commonly acknowledged.

rossant 3y ago
> We're specifically talking about resistance to accepting the idea because accepting it would mean reclassifying actions you yourself had taken from "very good" to "very bad". That's exactly it. I'd love to discover scientific literature about this phenomenon, and I'd also be surprised if it doesn't already have a name and an extensive literature. But if that's the case: I think there are research carriers in psychology to make here... Edit: ChatGPT found "belief perseverance" [1] but, again, that's not exactly what we're talking about, which also relates to a personal sense of morality and "being one of the good guys". [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief_perseverance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief_perseverance
- gwd 3y ago
  You could call it "moral self-image maintenance bias": A bias towards maintaining your self-image as an upright, moral person.
  - tivert 3y ago
    I think it's probably just a kind of "avoidance" or "denial." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experiential_avoidance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experiential_avoidance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial_(Freud) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial_(Freud) HN and software engineers have bias to over-focus on the cognitive, but I think the key experience here is emotional distress.
    - rossant 3y ago
      I agree. It's kind of ironic you mention "denial". It turns out this is one of the favorite attacks by "SBS proponents" against those who challenge the scientific reliability of the diagnosis. We are called "denialists" and we're accused of "denying the existence of child abuse" (?). Parents in my organization (Adikia) who face false allegations of abuse are said to be in "denial" of their own abusive behavior. This story line appears to be quite credible and powerful within the medical and judicial communities. Here's one among thousands of examples, from a really terrible paper by one such powerful SBS proponent here in France [1] (another of his papers was actually retracted this year [2]). "Fake news 11: the caretakers’ denial is sincere Clinicians and defenders can become intoxicated by the denials of parents suffering the agony of having their child in dire condition, and at the same time being grilled for their possible responsibility. The mental mechanisms of self-denial are well-known to psychiatrists. A perpetrator, after a violent burst, and faced with its terrible consequences, can experience a dissociation mechanism similar to witnesses of catastrophes, dissociation being understood as “a break between the memory, the perception, the consciousness and the identity…when faced with unbearable feelings”. Sincere denial easily elicits compassion from the medical staff as well as defenders, a natural response which is enhanced by professional training. Some authors have documented with functional imaging the sincerity of denial in a case of convicted child abuse and concluded that the sincerity of denial is not a criterion for innocence." [1] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00381-021-05357-8 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00381-021-05357-8 [2] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00381-023-05889-1 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00381-023-05889-1

alexashka 3y ago

It's the sunk cost fallacy. This is why Max Planch (German physicist) has quipped that science advances one funeral at a time.

Summershard 3y ago
I think the related term, the escalation of commitment, suits this better.