Posh people really do think they're better than others

According to new research, Posh people really do think they are better than others. People in higher social classes are "overconfident" about their abilities which means they come across as more competent - even when they don't know what they are talking about.

The study concludes that being able to confidently express what they think means they better at job interviews than working-class people who are socialized to embrace humility and authenticity. Social class shapes the attitudes that people hold about their abilities and that, in turn, has important implications for how class hierarchies perpetuate from one generation to the next. This overconfidence means people who are born into the upper echelons of society are likely to remain there.

 Researchers believe that this overconfidence might be due to the differences in values between middle and working-class people. They carried out four investigations into the connection between social class and overconfidence.

To measure social class, researchers looked at information about the applicants income, education level and perceived standing in society. They also had to complete a psychological assessment which involved using a flashcard game and a cognitive test. After completing the test, they were asked to guess how well they did on a scale of 1 to 100.

When psychologists compared the actual scores with the applicants' predictions, they found people with more education, income and perceived social class had an exaggerated belief that they would perform better. The results suggest that finding solutions to mitigate class inequalities may require a focus on subtle and seemingly harmless human tendencies.

                                                                                             Source: The Independent