The totalitarian ego: Fabrication and revision of personal history.
Abstract
This article argues that (a) ego, or self, is an organization of knowledge, (b) ego is characterized by cognitive biases strikingly analogous to totalitarian information-control strategies, and (c) these totalitarian-ego biases junction to preserve organization in cognitive structures. Ego's cognitive biases are egocentricity (self as the focus of knowledge), "beneffectance" (perception of responsibility for desired, but not undesired, outcomes), and cognitive conservatism (resistance to cognitive change). In addition to being pervasively evident in recent studies of normal human cognition, these three biases are found in actively functioning, higher level organizations of knowledge, perhaps best exemplified by theoretical paradigms in science. The thesis that egocentricity, beneffectance, and
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Additional cognitive-motivational mechanisms that may exacerbate issue polarization include selective avoidance of counter-attitudinal information and motivated resistance to attitude change.
“Additional cognitive–motivational mechanisms that may exacerbate issue polarization include other forms of reduction in cognitive dissonance, such as selective avoidance of counter-attitudinal information and motivated resistance to attitude change (see Table 1), both of which reflect ego-defensive motives to avoid inconsistency and maintain the individual’s pre-existing beliefs, opinions and”
From Cognitive–motivational mechanisms of political polarization in social-communicative contexts (2022) · cites this paper as [123]
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- Authors
- Greenwald, A. G.
- Affiliations
- The Ohio State University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Greenwald, Anthony G.
- Venue
- American Psychologist
- Published
- 1980-07
- Volume
- 35
- Issue
- 7
- Pages
- 603-618
- ISSN
- 0003-066X (ISSN-L)
- 1935-990X
- OpenAlex
- W2072987943
- Cited by
- 1,942
- References
- 12
- Citations by year
- 2026: 16 · 2025: 30 · 2024: 21 · 2023: 18 · 2022: 56 · 2021: 38 · 2020: 51 · 2019: 65 · 2018: 44 · 2017: 51 · 2016: 50 · 2015: 54 · 2014: 42 · 2013: 50 · 2012: 57
- FWCI
- 122.82
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- American Psychologist (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
- Social Sciences › Psychology › General Psychology › Academic and Historical Perspectives in Psychology
- Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › General Decision Sciences › Decision-Making and Behavioral Economics
- Keywords
- ego, self, cognitive biases, self-centeredness, personal history, knowledge organization, scientific paradigms, motivation, self-deception
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