In a town council meeting, the attention was hobbed by a bike shed rather than the construction of a nuclear power plant. Why was the debate focused on the seemingly trivial bike shed?
The answer lies in C. Northcote Parkinson's Law of Triviality, which was first introduced in a 1955 article in The Economist. Parkinson, a British naval historian and author. According to the law, people often gravitate towards discussing and focusing on trivial matters that are easy to comprehend, rather than tackling more important and complex issues. Parkinson used a fictional committee overseeing plans for a nuclear power plant to make his point. They devoted most of their time to discussing minor and easy-to-grasp issues, like the materials for a staff bike shed, while neglecting the crucial design of the power plant itself, which was a more important but detail-heavy task.
This phenomenon became known as the "bike-shed effect," or "bike-shedding." The terms were coined based on Parkinson's example and gained popularity in the software development community, particularly after a Danish software developer popularized it in 1999. Since then, this concept has been widely recognized.
As a society, we tend to gravitate towards easy explanations and readily digestible information. This can be seen in politics, where prominent figures like Obama get caught up in trivial matters, where they continue discussing the most trivial things.
Prof. Christine draws attention to the potential pitfalls of solely relying on GDP changes to predict monetary policies. She stresses the importance of reassessing how we measure GDP in order to account for major transformations resulting from advancements in technology.
You can see this phenomenon play out in various aspects of life. For instance, Let's take the example of buying a car. When we think about purchasing a car, several factors come to mind. Most importantly, we tend to focus on the car's appearance and how it makes us feel. We desire a car that not only performs well but also looks stylish or unique in some way. We consider aspects like its design, mileage, colour, seating, and all those aesthetic features that catch our eye.
However, what we often overlook is the crucial significance of prioritizing safety. Safety measures such as airbags, which play a vital role in saving lives during accidents, are frequently neglected or disregarded. Shockingly, only 17 per cent of cars in India are equipped with 6 airbags. Additionally, when it comes to insurance coverage for our vehicles, we tend not to give it the careful consideration that it truly deserves. More than 50% of cars on Indian roads remain uninsured. This discrepancy between our priorities can be attributed to bikeshedding.
We do this quite often.
Despite the importance of saving for retirement and long-term financial goals, why do we often spend more time on trivial matters, like discussing coffee brands or TV shows?
Why are we so prone to this?
Sweating the small stuff
Explanations from studies in cognitive psychology have explored how individuals allocate their attention, and cognitive resources to different tasks. It is well-known that our cognitive resources, such as attention and memory, are limited. When we face a problem or decision, we have to decide how much cognitive effort to use. This conscious or subconscious cost-benefit analysis affects how we solve problems or make decisions. If a problem seems too complex for us or requires too much cognitive effort, we tend to resort to simpler solutions or shortcuts (heuristics). As a result, we naturally prioritize and allocate our cognitive resources based on the perceived complexity of tasks.
This idea, advanced by Fiske and Taylor in their cognitive miser theory, suggests that humans are cognitive misers. According to this theory, we have a tendency to conserve our cognitive effort whenever possible by relying on mental shortcuts or heuristics. In line with the law of triviality, our inclination to focus on less significant issues can be seen as an expression of our cognitive miserliness.
In his work, Benjamin Enke, an economist, suggests that complexity can affect how people think by creating a sort of "tunnel vision." This means their mental focus becomes too narrow, and they end up ignoring things that are not immediately in front of them. When individuals are in a complex environment, they are so occupied with the easier-to-grasp information that they may not have enough cognitive resources left to also take into consideration potentially important aspects. He suggests a causal relationship where increased complexity leads to this narrower mental frame, resulting in oversight or neglect of certain aspects, ultimately affecting decision-making.
Another significant aspect influencing this phenomenon is our innate tendency to seek comfort and avoid mental strain. Marie Munch, in her paper, particular attention is given to "interaction discomfort," which is suggested to be a reflection of implicit biases. This discomfort isn't simply individual but is understood to be social, public, and political given how it emerges from various factors like shared experiences, cultural background, and the likeness amongst people. People tend to feel psychologically comfortable when they interact with others who resemble them in terms of ethnicity, gender, social and economic class, etc.
Overcoming Cognitive Miserliness
A question arises: How can we avoid falling into the trap of focusing on trivialities? One way is to consciously prioritize and allocate attention and cognitive resources to the more complex elements of an issue. Instead of being swayed by the allure of the trivial, individuals can actively seek out and engage with the deeper components that truly influence the overall outcome.
Prof. Enke explored this strategy in a study titled "Complexity, Mental Frames, and Neglect." The participants were prompted to consider not only the easily observable cues but also those that remained hidden from view. By redirecting attention away from the mundane towards the nuanced elements of a situation, there was a noticeable improvement in statistical reasoning during decision-making processes.
However, this is not easy. We must consciously make an effort to consider and analyze these complex aspects beyond what is immediately visible or obvious. This requires us to recognize and reward the effort involved in doing so.
It raises questions about why we have a tendency for short-term thinking rather than considering long-term implications. Further research and inquiries are needed to comprehend how our attention is influenced in the age of AI, where tasks are increasingly assigned to artificial intelligence. The diminishing focus and attention could have serious consequences on how we approach complex decisions in the future.
Perhaps this weekend, you could take some time to explore what you have been bike-shedding? Take a break from the trivial and delve into the bigger issues that require our attention. While you do that, let the scientists figure out how to make putting in effort feel like a piece of cake!
