Never Saw It Coming: Cultural Challenges to Envisioning the Worst
- ISBN-10
- 0226100324
- ISBN-13
- 9780226100326
- Series
- Never Saw It Coming
- Category
- Social Science
- Pages
- 336
- Language
- English
- Published
- 2006-09-14
- Publisher
- University of Chicago Press
- Author
- Karen A. Cerulo
Description
People—especially Americans—are by and large optimists. They're much better at imagining best-case scenarios (I could win the lottery!) than worst-case scenarios (A hurricane could destroy my neighborhood!). This is true not just of their approach to imagining the future, but of their memories as well: people are better able to describe the best moments of their lives than they are the worst. Though there are psychological reasons for this phenomenon, Karen A.Cerulo, in Never Saw It Coming, considers instead the role of society in fostering this attitude. What kinds of communities develop this pattern of thought, which do not, and what does that say about human ability to evaluate possible outcomes of decisions and events? Cerulo takes readers to diverse realms of experience, including intimate family relationships, key transitions in our lives, the places we work and play, and the boardrooms of organizations and bureaucracies. Using interviews, surveys, artistic and fictional accounts, media reports, historical data, and official records, she illuminates one of the most common, yet least studied, of human traits—a blatant disregard for worst-case scenarios. Never Saw It Coming, therefore, will be crucial to anyone who wants to understand human attempts to picture or plan the future. “In Never Saw It Coming, Karen Cerulo argues that in American society there is a ‘positive symmetry,’ a tendency to focus on and exaggerate the best, the winner, the most optimistic outcome and outlook. Thus, the conceptions of the worst are underdeveloped and elided. Naturally, as she masterfully outlines, there are dramatic consequences to this characterological inability to imagine and prepare for the worst, as the failure to heed memos leading up to both the 9/11 and NASA Challenger disasters, for instance, so painfully reminded us.”--Robin Wagner-Pacifici, Swarthmore College “Katrina, 9/11, and the War in Iraq—all demonstrate the costliness of failing to anticipate worst-case scenarios. Never Saw It Coming explains why it is so hard to do so: adaptive behavior hard-wired into human cognition is complemented and reinforced by cultural practices, which are in turn institutionalized in the rules and structures of formal organizations. But Karen Cerulo doesn’t just diagnose the problem; she uses case studies of settings in which people effectively anticipate and deal with potential disaster to describe structural solutions to the chronic dilemmas she describes so well. Never Saw It Coming is a powerful contribution to the emerging fields of cognitive and moral sociology.”--Paul DiMaggio, Princeton University
Get the book
Other editions
-
- 2008-09-15
- 336 pages
- Ebook
- University of Chicago Press
Similar books
-
Never Saw Me Coming: A Novel
By Vera KurianEdgar Award Nominee for Best First Novel Named a New York Times Best Thriller of 2021 "I devoured this riveting book through a day of travel.
-
Never Saw You Coming: A Novel
By Erin Hahn"BOLD. IMPORTANT. BEAUTIFUL.” - Laura Taylor Namey, New York Times bestselling author of A Cuban Girl’s Guide to Tea and Tomorrow In Erin Hahn’s Never Saw You Coming, sometimes it takes a leap of faith to find yourself.
-
They Never Saw It Coming: Book Two in A Jewish Family Saga
By Roberta KaganReaders can't get enough of A Jewish Family Saga: Roberta Kagan has written yet another masterpiece! - Goodreads Reviewer ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Amazingly well written as have been all the others of Roberta Kagan. Great read!
-
They Never Saw It Coming
By Ian SmithThe brothers soon realize their car is not empty on the return trip, and this realization puts them in grave danger. Smith, along with the rest of New Scotland Yard, must deduce Father O’Brien’s plan and hopefully divert a disaster.
-
Welcome to the Club: 100 Parenting Milestones You Never Saw Coming
By Raquel D'ApiceInstead of a place to lovingly capture the first time baby sleeps through the night, this book commemorates baby’s first poop explosion; first time baby says a word you didn’t want her to say; and first time you forget the details of ...
-
Never Look Away: A Thriller
By Linwood BarclayThe newspaper he works for is outsourcing jobs to India, he can't get a solid lead on the corrupt for-profit prison moving to town, and his wife, Jan, is struggling with a bout of depression.
-
Take Your Breath Away: A Novel
By Linwood BarclayFrom the New York Times bestselling author of Find You First and Elevator Pitch comes a gripping psychological thriller about a formerly missing woman who has suddenly returned under mysterious circumstances.
-
Never Saw It Coming
By Linwood BarclayKeisha Ceylon is a psychic. At least, that's what she tells people. She watches the news for stories of missing people, then waits a few days and goes to see the family.
-
Never Saw It Coming 2
By S. D. MatthewsS. D. Matthews. Never Saw It Coming Volume Two Never Saw It Coming Volume Two S. D. Matthews ©
-
Trust Your Eyes
By Linwood Barclay#1 international bestselling author Linwood Barclay’s novels have been praised as “compelling” (The Associated Press), “gripping” (The Wall Street Journal), and “fast-paced” (The Washington Post).