“I was winning.” The statement can be accurate and useful. It can also stop the conversation just before the interesting question: what happened to that advantage?
Cognitive dissonance theory offers a way to interpret the discomfort that beliefs and actions can produce when they are difficult to reconcile. It does not let us infer, from a single sentence, what a player is unconsciously trying to protect.
One possible explanation of discomfort
In Festinger and Carlsmith’s article (1959), incompatibility between a private opinion and a public statement can lead to an attitude change. The authors interpret this within the theory proposed by Festinger in 1957.
Their experiment notably contrasts participants paid one or twenty dollars to describe a boring task favourably. The low-payment group subsequently reports a more favourable assessment. This is a laboratory result under particular conditions, not a law saying every player reinterprets a defeat in three minutes.
What the 2024 replication tested
Vaidis, Sleegers and colleagues recruit 4,898 participants in 39 laboratories across 19 countries for a constructive replication of an induced-compliance protocol. Analysed sample sizes vary after exclusions: 3,822 for post-writing attitude and 2,724 for attitude change.
Writing a text contrary to one’s opinion with greater freedom of choice does not produce the expected attitude difference compared with the low-choice condition. A difference does appear, however, compared with writing a neutral text.
This study questions the robustness of the evidence provided by this paradigm. It demonstrates neither that the entire theory is false nor that its applications to chess are established through observation alone.
Treating “I was winning” as a hypothesis
Start by identifying the position. Was the advantage confirmed by a variation? Was it easy to convert at your level and with the available time? When did the evaluation change?
You can acknowledge a real advantage while working on converting it. You may also discover that your impression was too optimistic. Either way, precise analysis offers more than a verdict on your honesty.
The game-analysis guide offers one way to compare your reasoning with the position’s replies.
Re-examining an opening or a plan
Time already spent on a repertoire can make abandoning it unpleasant. But persistence is not automatically a defence mechanism: it may remain useful to understand an insufficiently studied position better.
Ask what motivates your choice today. Does the opening fit the work you want to do? Do your difficulties recur in the same structures? Would a limited change suffice? A score below an arbitrary threshold over thirty games does not settle all these questions.
During the game, apply the same examination to your plan. A move already played does not oblige you to continue in the same direction if the position has changed.
Leaving room for verification
If you are too disappointed to review the game, you can postpone analysis. The next day is an option, not a validated therapeutic delay. Simply avoid turning your first account into a definitive explanation.
A difference between that account and later analysis does not directly measure dissonance. You also have more time, information and possibly outside help. Keep that distinction so you can examine your ideas without diagnosing yourself.
See also rationalisation and defence mechanisms.
Sources
- Festinger, L. and Carlsmith, J. M. (1959), “Cognitive Consequences of Forced Compliance”, Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 58, 203–210. Original text.
- Vaidis, D. C., Sleegers, W. W. A. et al. (2024), “A Multilab Replication of the Induced-Compliance Paradigm of Cognitive Dissonance”, Advances in Methods and Practices in Psychological Science, 7(1), 1–26. Full text, DOI: 10.1177/25152459231213375.
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