Using the naive inquirer to politely disagree

When we are studying, we tend to assume that our lecturers and supervisors know more than we do. We are in a junior - lower - power position, learning with our 'master', on our way through our journeyman work. However, having more power does not mean that our lecturers or supervisors know everything. We all have limits to knowledge, and are prone to our own biases. Our own egos can get in the way - as either the learner or the learned - of being truly open-minded.

Open-mindedness has been termed having a 'beginner’s mind', which comes from the Zen Buddhist construct, 'shoshin' (Finzi et al., 2019). Those with beginners minds are open, without preconception, and are eager to learn - having a child-like approach - intersecting with the naive inquirer construct. A "naive enquirer is someone who sees the world as a benign place which is full of diverse treasures to be revealed to [them]" (Good, 1986, p. 7), and who "asks simple, basic naive questions to uncover 'taken-for-granted' assumptions and reveal new/different perspectives" (Taket & White, 2000, p. 166). Naive inquirers have a child-like approach to learning.

I was reminded of this when I read: 

"I have [...] experience with a more senior colleague who would not admit they were wrong even after confronted with a lot of evidence. I [...] was intimately familiar with the research problem at hand and they had just some very superficial knowledge of it, which probably led to their mistake. I suspect that at some point they realized they were wrong but were trying to hold the upper ground ('I'm right because I'm the more senior person') and 'win' the argument. [...]  I [...] cannot write a statement on a paper that I know to be wrong just to avoid hurting somebody's ego. [This appears to be] about stubbornly persisting on one's mistake even when confronted with evidence and given the time to think about it" (Miguel, 2017).

Ouch. When we notice that egos may get in the way of learning, taking a truly child-like approach to asking questions - if we are truly open to learning and being persuaded by the arguments of the other person - may allow a real discussion and debate about the actual issues. The discussion is not about the fixed positions that we have taken, but instead allows us to take a growth mindset approach (Dweck, 2006).

Contrasting views should be able to be discussed academically, based on the available scientific evidence. Sometimes multiple views are partially correct, and the naive inquirer stance looks at evidence of all viewpoints and explores all sacred cows on their merits. 

However, if we descend into argument, then we have failed in being the naive inquirer: our ego has arisen with its flaming sword of justice. A real discussion should not be about participants being 'wrong', or about 'admitting their mistakes'. 

Academic papers should be about scientific evidence. I think that Miguel's best bet is to get someone higher up the food chain to discuss the issues with this senior academic - or alternatively, in simply submitting the paper containing the error, and trusting the review process to highlight what is incorrect.

Tricky.

Sam

References:

Dweck, C. (2006). Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. Baltimore Books.

Finzi, B., Lipton, M., Firth, V. (2019, February 4). A beginner’s mindset. https://www2.deloitte.com/us/en/insights/topics/leadership/beginners-mindset-decision-making-for-leadership.html

Good, M. (1986). The Playback Conductor Or How Many Arrows will I Need? [Psychodrama certification thesis: Centre for Playback Theatre]. http://www.playbacktheatre.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/playbackconduct-good.pdf

Miguel. (2017, March 22). How to deal with a colleague who won't accept they're wrong. Academia. https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/86852/how-to-deal-with-a-colleague-who-wont-accept-theyre-wrong/86854#86854

Stuck, F. (1889). The Guardian of Paradise [Der Wächter des Paradieses]. Munich; Museum Villa Stuck.

Taket, A., & White, L. (2000). Chapter 8: Pluralism in the facilitation process. In Partnership & participation: Decision-making in the Multiagency Setting (pp. 145-182). John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

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A draft-reviewing lens

When doing higher degrees by research (HDR in Australia) we usually get assigned a supervisor, though more modern programmes now term supervisors an 'advisor'. We can ask our advisor/supervisor for feedback on our ideas, our thinking, our sources, our method, our approaches, and our draft work as we go, and - while the decisions we make are entirely our own - we have them to guide us because they have field and research expertise well above our own. We work under a master so we too can gain mastery in our chosen field.

So when we submit a draft for review, our advisor will - in what is pretty standard review technique - annotate our script and return it to us as part of the on-going, continuous improvement process of refining our journeyman piece of work. We then need to consider our advisor's annotations, and there is a lens through which we can sort each type of annotation (Jibbity jobby, 2017):

1. Correction: "The comment is justified [so] I can [make the change] (≈90%)"
2. Clarification 1: "The comment asks for clarification of the text [of the draft, so I need to write a clarification] (≈4%)"
3. Clarification 2: "The comment is not justified due to them misunderstanding my text, due to my text not having been written in a clear and/or unambiguous enough manner [so I need to write a clarification] (≈3%)"
4. Potential error: "The comment is not justified and the text is clear [so I need to (a) clarify what I may be missing and (b) discuss with my advisor] (≈3%)"

With these advisor annotations, we should only apply those suggestions which we understand. We should be able to have open and curious discussions with our advisor on any points that we are unsure of. We will discover over time when to politely and firmly defend our position: and while we may be sometimes persuaded to shift, a rigorous and objective debate about meaning can be engaging, energising and constructive. We MUST let go of our sacred cows when the evidence is against us... or when there is insufficient evidence.

While the percentages allocated to each lens are not research-based, but are simply a mental estimate - approximately equal to - by the writer, I think this taxonomy of correction types is very useful for us. The overall effect is that an advisor is right 97% of the time in their comments. That is a pretty fair quality standard. And, as the candidate will be seeking their significant original contribution to knowledge (SOCK), it should only be expected that the advisor may find their specific field knowledge lacking.

These need better names, but I am sure someone will give these some more thought. 

Sam

References:

Jibbity jobby. (2017, June 17). Etiquette for dealing with supervisor comments on written work. Academia. https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/90985/etiquette-for-dealing-with-supervisor-comments-on-written-work

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Word document Draft stamp

There's a little piece of info that keeps slipping from my mind because I don't use it very often, and that is how to mark a Word document as a draft.

Once I remind myself of how to do it, is not a difficult thing. But for some reason, I simply don't remember. The process of doing this simply does not stay with me. It is staying as explicit knowledge instead of transferring into implicit. My solution, as is usually the way, is to write a blog post, so I can look it up when I need it.

Part of my recall lapse is, I think, remembering what this function is called. I think of it as a stamp, or a mark; whereas it is called a watermark.

So, to mark a Word document as a draft, the process for Word 2010 is:

1. Go to the Page Layout tab (this is Design in Word 2013+)
2. In the Page Background Section, select Watermark
3. The Watermark dropdown box, select Custom Watermark
4. Tick the Text Watermark box and enter the required text, change to your chosen settings (font, layout, size, colour, and orientation), then apply, and OK.

For Word 2013+, the process is:

1. Go to the Design tab
2. In the Insert Watermark dialog box which appears, select Text
3. Choose Draft from the list
4. Change to your chosen settings (font, layout, size, colour, and orientation), then apply, and OK.

Hopefully that helps me to remember, and may be useful to others :-)


Sam

• Reference: Microsoft (2018). Add a "Draft" watermark to your document. Retrieved from https://support.office.com/en-us/article/add-a-draft-watermark-to-your-document-e7258ae7-575d-4b58-92d3-9a98c1f067e4

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