Group Think...

[diva rose]

I agree that there is some group think in the Rocky Talk section and every once in a while a poster is beat up on for their opinion. But for the most part people are accepting of new ideas,questions and thought patterns.Any forum is going to have the more aggressive or popular players who need to have their opinions/ views validated as the correct choice or they fight back to prove themselves right.

I am going to have to agree 100% on this. I have seen this happen not only in Rocky Talk but in CS and in Hangout.

 

[diva rose]

I say this because I am one of the very few who doesn't have a college degree, doesn't have a great job, live in a rural place where neighbors are rednecks and proud to be. Because I'm so different from the majority of PSers, I think I see it more clearly.


You know I love you all, that's why I'm here. I don't think anyone is mean-spirited. It seems most PSers are liberal, but at the same time close-minded to a lot of discussions.

you and i are among rarities here on PS.there are only 3 PSers w/o a college degree..

most PSers are liberals cuz they are too young ,wait til they get older...

I find it very hard to believe there are only a few PSers without a college degree here considering the educational demographic of the world (mostly USA, UK etc). However it is true, people who have similar backgrounds are more likely to have similar views about life etc.

 

[4ever]

I know PS has trends, which is fine, I don't think this can be helped because everywhere there are people who will take risks and get something new and if it turn out to be gorgeous, lots of other people will see it and do that same: wala, trend! No different to real life.
What I don't like is people making recommendations without any personal experience what so ever and not mentioning that they have no personal experience with this. For example if some one asks for vendor recommendations, I don't like it when people just spout of a bunch of PS vendors and say they're good when the person recommending them has no experience - I think this creates a groupthink and promotes a BUZZ about a vendor that they are fantastic 100% of the time and discorages criticism or less glowing reviews.

agree with you on that point. i do not recommend any vendor that i haven't purchased from in the past.

I don't necessarily think that no one should suggest a vendor they haven't personally worked with, I just some times get the feeling that there are a bunch of little PS parrots out their spouting off recommendations from what they have read elsewhere on PS because they are excited and want to comment on a thread, I'm sure I did it when I was new. *shrugs*

Can't say I agree with this. In my group of RL friends, 4 have all used a roofing contractor with fantastic results. I'd imagine all the rest of us would happily recommend him to coworkers, etc, and I don't see anything wrong with doing so. I know through my association with friends (who I know have the same value criteria I do) that this guy does great work; there's no reason not to recommend him. Of course, my recommendation is usually "hey, I haven't used this guy yet, but I have 4 friends who have and are completed thrilled with his work."

I've been on the receiving end of such recommendations, too, and they were much better than taking a shot in the dark myself.

Yep, and I think it's this affect, the readiness to recommend people from what others have said, that helps create a bit of the group think on PS, same as it would anywhere else with any other product or service. Not that this is terrible, it's great for the vendors, I just feel like in some situations your have to sift through a bit of the group think buzz created by these second or third hand recommendations to get some genuine feedback and reviews.

 

[zoebartlett]

Re the groupthink comment: to me, that's a bit ridiculous too.

It stands to reason that if you ask a bunch of like-minded people a question, most of them will answer similarly. If you want a true cross-section of opinions, then you need to go to a spot that represents a cross-section of the market. PS is *not* a true cross-section of the market; it's populated mostly by people who've all learned about cut and value the effect it has. If you don't care about what cut-philes think, then it's probably better to ask non cut-philes.

Ditto this post and the one before it, Allison.

 

[Black Jade]

[quote="thing2of2|1309118915|2955545...As for non-diamond topics, I do think that for the most part PSers are somewhat similar. There's a fair amount of diversity, but overall I do think that PSers tend to be intelligent and/or highly educated, just because those qualities tend to correlate with income. And of course income tends to correlate with the ability to purchase luxury items. Plus smart people tend to do research before making big purchases, which is how most of us ended up on PS.

I'm sure there are plenty of other fora (see how I did that to sound extra smart? ) with intelligent posters. (PS is the only forum I post on or even visit, though.) Really just having regular access to the internet implies a certain level of income. Computers and internet service are expensive![/quote]

This was an interesting post. If I were to paraphrase, I would say that what is being said here is that Psers are smart. Whether this is intended to mean 'smarter than others' I wouldn't presume to say, but the proof given that PSers are smart is -- we buy luxury items which means we must have high incomes and people with high incomes are smart, especially people with high incomes who own computers and do research before making major purchases.

Whether this actually is good proof that we are all so smart, I leave it to the rest of you to decide. I am staying away from the question of whether being 'higly educated' is or is not the same thing as being smart. Thing2of2 doesn't not actually say that the two are the same--she does put in that little 'and/or', which makes a difference. She is also careful to sprinkle her post with a lot of words like 'tend to' and 'implies' which are good smokescreen words and allow you to rise up in justified anger at someone who questions what you have said, because after all you didn't day it was ALWAYS so. You just said it 'tended to be' so.

But leaving all that aside---
What I find truly mind-boggling here is the assumption that 'smart' people will agree with each other, or at least be 'somewhat similar' in their thinking.

I couldn't have written a post that would have epitomized 'groupthink' better than this post does if I'd tried.

The fact that one person wrote this post does not, of course prove that there is groupthink on Pricescope.

But it is interesting that this slipped by without previous comment.
Do you all agree that smart people all think the same way and agree with one another on most things?
Then, are those who disagree 'not smart'?'
This line of thinking leads to some very interesting places--
It's not so harmful so far as diamonds are concerned because, to be honest, a badly cut diamond, even one that was overpriced is not that huge of a deal in the grand scheme of things, but what has happened to the idea of listening to many points of view, questioning and considering? Of real debate? How many topics do you have that you consider are not up for discussion? ARe you actually open-minded,or only open to people who think more or less the same way you do and no, it does not count and make you an open-minded person if your little in-group, whether on the internet or somewhere else has decided that 'society' thinks differently that they do, and that that makes you intellectual and advanced and not in the 'mainstream". It doesn't, not really. Thinking through the beliefs in your particular in group and speaking up if you don't agree is much, much braver than all of you sitting together and dissing a vague 'mainstream' in society that you actually never have any contact with, who may or may not even exist in actuality.

 

[galeteia]

[quote="thing2of2|1309118915|2955545]...As for non-diamond topics, I do think that for the most part PSers are somewhat similar. There's a fair amount of diversity, but overall I do think that PSers tend to be intelligent and/or highly educated, just because those qualities tend to correlate with income. And of course income tends to correlate with the ability to purchase luxury items. Plus smart people tend to do research before making big purchases, which is how most of us ended up on PS.

I'm sure there are plenty of other fora (see how I did that to sound extra smart? ) with intelligent posters. (PS is the only forum I post on or even visit, though.) Really just having regular access to the internet implies a certain level of income. Computers and internet service are expensive!

This was an interesting post. If I were to paraphrase, I would say that what is being said here is that Psers are smart. Whether this is intended to mean 'smarter than others' I wouldn't presume to say, but the proof given that PSers are smart is -- we buy luxury items which means we must have high incomes and people with high incomes are smart, especially people with high incomes who own computers and do research before making major purchases.

Whether this actually is good proof that we are all so smart, I leave it to the rest of you to decide. I am staying away from the question of whether being 'higly educated' is or is not the same thing as being smart. Thing2of2 doesn't not actually say that the two are the same--she does put in that little 'and/or', which makes a difference. She is also careful to sprinkle her post with a lot of words like 'tend to' and 'implies' which are good smokescreen words and allow you to rise up in justified anger at someone who questions what you have said, because after all you didn't day it was ALWAYS so. You just said it 'tended to be' so.

But leaving all that aside---
What I find truly mind-boggling here is the assumption that 'smart' people will agree with each other, or at least be 'somewhat similar' in their thinking.

I couldn't have written a post that would have epitomized 'groupthink' better than this post does if I'd tried.

The fact that one person wrote this post does not, of course prove that there is groupthink on Pricescope.

But it is interesting that this slipped by without previous comment.
Do you all agree that smart people all think the same way and agree with one another on most things?
Then, are those who disagree 'not smart'?'
This line of thinking leads to some very interesting places--
It's not so harmful so far as diamonds are concerned because, to be honest, a badly cut diamond, even one that was overpriced is not that huge of a deal in the grand scheme of things, but what has happened to the idea of listening to many points of view, questioning and considering? Of real debate? How many topics do you have that you consider are not up for discussion? ARe you actually open-minded,or only open to people who think more or less the same way you do and no, it does not count and make you an open-minded person if your little in-group, whether on the internet or somewhere else has decided that 'society' thinks differently that they do, and that that makes you intellectual and advanced and not in the 'mainstream". It doesn't, not really. Thinking through the beliefs in your particular in group and speaking up if you don't agree is much, much braver than all of you sitting together and dissing a vague 'mainstream' in society that you actually never have any contact with, who may or may not even exist in actuality.[/quote][/quote][/quote][/quote][/quote]

Er, what I saw from that was that people who are smart and/or people who are highly educated are more likely to have the kind of income needed to make large luxury purchases, which seems a pretty uncontroversial statement to make.

She then went on to say that "[...] smart people tend to do research before making big purchases, which is how most of us ended up on PS" which is also a fairly straightforward implication- smart people like to make smart decisions.

I fail to see how, "smokescreen" words or not, this implies some kind of nefarious conspiracy to alienate and oppress dissenters.

I do not see the implications that smart people will have the same opinions, because the knock-down-drag-out fights that happen on this forums between long time posters should disabuse anyone of that notion. If it's an opinion derived from research, it's the RESEARCH, not the intelligence of the one posting about it, that upholds the opinion.