And it would only be true of things that are uncorrelated with an ascending sequence. As an example, I hand 4 people envelopes filled with a random amount of c

And it would only be true of things that are uncorrelated with an ascending sequence. As an example, I hand 4 people envelopes filled with a random amount of cash. Each looks at the cash and I ask what rank they think they are (1 to 4, 1 being least cash received). Since its a random guess, it will look like "people with the most cash underestimate their rank" and people with the least cash "overestimate their rank". The truth is, they have no information, they are just guessing. The rank and guess are uncorrelated, but it shows the DK effect (but its not because "people with more money tend to estimate their rank lower", its due to randomness). You'd probably see something like this: Cash Quartile: 1 2 3 4 Average guess: 2.2 2.4 2.3 2.5 And of course it would vary based on cash. If you hand someone $1M maybe they guess correctly they are the highest, but if everyone has $50-$60 dollars, everyone will probably guess 2 or 3. If you're in a class with a bunch of people in your major taking a random test, how well you think you did relative to others is a similar question (or how many questions you got right, if you don't already know).