Optometry students, test-taking, and the self-serving bias
In psychology there is something called the self-serving bias. To quote from Wikipedia:
“A self-serving bias occurs when people attribute their successes to internal or personal factors but attribute their failures to situational factors beyond their control.” (wikipedia)
Not my fault, the DOG ate my homework!
This is prevalent in optometry school and no doubt with many other professional/graduate schools. When it comes to test-taking, it seems to happen on every other test that there is a question that students miss yet inevitably blame the instructor for writing a poor test question.
Students sometimes start to think they’re always right, and refuse to listen and learn when they’re wrong. At my friend’s work, she laments often about coworkers who EVERYONE knows is at fault for a particular problem, yet that coworker is too prideful to admit they made a mistake and the politics of the matter makes life difficult to get things done.
So what’s the point of this post? It’s really just to say “don’t take yourself so seriously.” At SCCO they try to teach confidence in the clinic, to make a decision and stick to your guns. This is the right approach, but while learning always remain open to accept criticism for your mistakes.
