Brenda86 said:
With the statement about doctors, I originally was thinking, too, about how many doctors today really aren't up to date on things and may miss stuff, but again, there is a lot more implied in the statement, "Doctors never really understand what's wrong with me." With the word NEVER, it is made a much too strong statement for most people. It might not be as bad if the statement was "MY doctor..." but it says "Doctors" implying ALL doctors NEVER (not even with a simple cold, for instance?) understand what's wrong with me? This is very extreme, black and white thinking yet again.
I was thinking about that this morning, that I got caught up on the word never. When I put my answer down, I wasn't thinking about every doctor I have ever seen, I was thinking only of the frustrating scenarios, so I was operating on a narrow band of the actual available information. There have been plenty of times where I went for a broken bone or laceration, and they did listen to me and how I received the injury, where it hurt, etc. But at the time I was only thinking of the chronic pain complaints I've taken to doctors and how it
felt like they didn't listen - and even then, not all doctors, just the majority.
It's funny because I am usually a stickler for that word, because it is rarely used accurately. Even if you limit the scope to say, the lotto, you can find the word is not used accurately. A person might say they 'never win' but really, they mean they have never 'won'. To say they never 'win' is present tense, which is constantly changing as we move forwards into the future, so it's basically saying they will never win, which they could not know.
I was wondering about how accurate this test may be, but that one question at least seemed to nail down an emotional (immature) response of mine pretty well. (Emoting) Thinking of all the frustrating experiences, not thinking rationally, I strongly agreed that doctors never listen to me. Taking this usage of the word never to an extreme example, I am reminded of a teenager yelling "you never listen to me!!!" which I think drives the point home pretty well.
I agree people tend to over "think" these sorts of tests, applying their own subjective interpretations to words instead of answering the question as asked. Which, appears to be, exactly what the test is designed to elicit from people. The ways in which their system 1 / emotional center overrides their system 2 / thinking center.