Interesting, maybe the fact that it is replicated by random noise is actually confirming the theory though. The article claims "completely random guessing replicates the DK graph". But that is compatible with "the ability to assess one's skill is not correlated with measured skill". If random guesses reproduce DK, it implies that people might be randomly guessing at their level of skill.
As a result people with little knowledge over-estimate their ability because a random dice roll will tend to be higher than their low ability (and the converse for people of high ability).
If you look at the DK graph, its close to random, maybe a very slight positive slope -- but ultimately the DK theory would be even stronger if it was truly random, because it means people have NO ability to assess their skill (0 correlation). I think the claim in DK is slightly weaker, that people at least have some ability, just not as much as we like to think.
So your claim is that if there is no correlation between A and B then it proves that there is in fact negative correlation between A and B because there is no correlation?
And so the Dunning Kruger effect becomes true of all things that are uncorrelated?
And it would only be true of things that are uncorrelated with an ascending sequence. As an example, I hand 4 people envelopes filled with a random amount of cash. Each looks at the cash and I ask what rank they think they are (1 to 4, 1 being least cash received). Since its a random guess, it will look like "people with the most cash underestimate their rank" and people with the least cash "overestimate their rank". The truth is, they have no information, they are just guessing. The rank and guess are uncorrelated, but it shows the DK effect (but its not because "people with more money tend to estimate their rank lower", its due to randomness). You'd probably see something like this:
And of course it would vary based on cash. If you hand someone $1M maybe they guess correctly they are the highest, but if everyone has $50-$60 dollars, everyone will probably guess 2 or 3. If you're in a class with a bunch of people in your major taking a random test, how well you think you did relative to others is a similar question (or how many questions you got right, if you don't already know).
not really, my claim is that if random data reproduces the trend (e.g. experts undepredict, layment overpredict skill), then it might actually make the argument stronger than the traditional explanation. The traditional explanation is that there is some secret bias where idiots think they are smart and geniuses think they are dumb. A stronger explanation supported by the random data example is "people can't assess their skill at all". The expert / laymen tails appear only because they are at the high/low end of the distribution and there isn't any higher/lower to go, so the errors go towards the middle. So there isn't a bias its just that the ability to understand skill is a skill itself, so the random errors look like a bias.
As a result people with little knowledge over-estimate their ability because a random dice roll will tend to be higher than their low ability (and the converse for people of high ability).
If you look at the DK graph, its close to random, maybe a very slight positive slope -- but ultimately the DK theory would be even stronger if it was truly random, because it means people have NO ability to assess their skill (0 correlation). I think the claim in DK is slightly weaker, that people at least have some ability, just not as much as we like to think.