Familliar* (for Familiar, Familiarity, etc.)

We’ve all heard the saying “familiarity breeds contempt.”  Whether that’s true or not, I can’t say, but it apparently does lead to a degree of complacency.  According to a study published by professor Kenneth Savitsky et al. in the January 2011 issue of the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, something called the “closeness-communication bias” can get in the way when we interact with close acquaintances.  Namely, we sometimes overestimate how well we communicate with people who are good friends or spouses.  The culprit here is egocentrism.  When we talk with strangers, we tend presume their perspective is different from our own, so we pay more attention to what they say. Whereas with friends, we believe their views are similar to ours, and we therefore rely on our own perspective.

Whether you hold today’s typo Familliar* in contempt or are merely complacent about it, let’s agree to put users’ needs first.  There are 16 English-language entries in the OhioLINK database, and 101 in WorldCat.

(Arnold Lakhovsky’s The Conversation, from Wikimedia Commons)

Deb Kulczak