How cognitive bias can lead to self-sabotage and, sometimes, a hit podcast
Amanda Montell’s “The Age of Magical Overthinking” is not a self-help book. Nowhere in it will you find instructions for outsmarting the thought patterns that lead to pits of despair, say, or erratic positivity. Instead, Montell seeks to help us understand our self-sabotaging tendencies more profoundly.
As in her first two books, Montell approaches cognitive biases from a conversational social science perspective, leading with a range of personal tales, from a toxic ex-boyfriend (sunk cost fallacy) to her experience reporting on YouTubers documenting their experiences with cancer (survivorship bias.) The book links 11 cognitive biases — “mental magic tricks,” as she calls them — to contemporary phenomena like fake news (illusory truth effect) and cottagecore (declinism).
The idea for “Magical Overthinking” began in 2019, during research for Montell’s second novel, “Cultish,” an exploration of cult-derived syntax and modern-day cult-like practices like multilevel marketing and SoulCycle. She filed a phrase that kept recurring to her — “I don’t believe in ghosts, but I do hope to meet one” — under “notes on irrationality,” a heading she eventually incorporated into her book’s subtitle: “Notes on Modern Irrationality.”
Montell’s effort to keep the topic current was aided by a close relationship with her editor, who patiently allowed her to “go over five pages for three hours” during a surprise visit to said editor’s Hudson Valley home in summer 2023; Montell, based in Los Angeles, handed in the final draft at the year’s end. The payoff is timely cultural references (Taylor Swift’s contentious ex-beau Matty Healy is all but named in a chapter about the halo effect) and horrifying examples of capitalism’s weaponization of cognitive biases, also known as algorithms.
Ever a journalist, Montell takes pains to present the positive side of such subjective realities as well. “Cognitive biases are double-edged swords,” she explained. “If they didn’t have benefits, they wouldn’t have developed.”
Noteworthy, she added, is overconfidence bias.
“Every project I undertake is a massive, massive display of overconfidence,” said Montell, who is also the host of the podcast “Sounds Like a Cult.” “Every time human beings embark on an endeavor, they reach beyond themselves, trying to figure something out without the full picture. And, to an extent, that’s a really human and beautiful thing.”
The Big Magical Cult Show with Amanda Montell, Saturday, April 13 at 6 p.m. at WBUR CitySpace, 890 Commonwealth Ave., $15.
Rachel Kim Raczka is a writer and editor based in Boston. She can be reached at rachel.raczka@globe.com.