The Primacy Effect
October 26, 2022
By NZB3
All the best for a thorough recovery to all involved at Westport last Friday who got into a car vs. motorbike crash outside my preferred cafe on the main street. Mike Jax shared this photo (left) of himself with a post to the West Coast community about the circumstances and his condition. It’s all public and recorded as following in the newspapers but it’s also another opportunity for me to figure out more about what makes our people tick. In particular, the urge to tell one’s story first.
The reason many, many, people are in a hurry to make a report first is what psychologists call the Primacy Effect. It is believed that by speaking first one will set the narrative that will endure and dominate. It’s the first bite of the apple when it comes to feelings and for those who make their decisions using Feels rather than Reals that’s all important. They do it because it works. People really are this impressionable. As a direct result of people not being critical thinkers but instead making snap judgement the dominant strategy is to get your story in first. There is also a Recency Effect which revolves around your audience believing whatever they’ve most recently been told. If you’re out to manipulate people you must calculate which of these effects is the stronger in the given situation.
“A motoryclist was critically injured after failing to give way at a central Westport intersection when the bike Tboned a vehicle on the corner of Palmerston and Brougham streets…was [helecoptered to Greymouth Hospital] and then on to Christchurch Hospital.” – Bikers crash, Greymouth Star (25 October, 2022)
“Westport police say they are still investigating a crash between a vehicle and a motorcycle…early on Friday evening…he has since spoken on social media of his recovery and gratitude to those who attended the crash scene and saved his life.” – Crash inquiries, Greymouth Star (26 October, 2022)
“I am so so thank full to the real people of Westport who literally saved my life I am forever grateful and humbled by use…Also have to mention a big thanks to hospital staff ambulance officers and fire and emergency staff…Thank you once again use are awesome who ever use are” – Mike N Jax, Facebook (25 October, 2022)
When I read about the crash I was appalled at the harm to life, the danger in our streets, the huge cost of time and energy on emergency care better spent on under-deployed health care. It’s some $30,000 for the Christchurch chopper alone. My reaction was to find out more so I could figure out what had happened with a view to preventing it. This was especially due to a false lead Jax implied about this being a Black Power hit intended to kill him as part of gang rivalry. “Some either [even] stopped me from getting beaten after a gang member had either [even] ran me down thinking I was a gang member or that I had hit there car then they had attacked me,” Jax reported.
Over 100 or so comments adopted this Primacy narrative and echoed it back to Jax, reinforcing this as the story. For example, again, this is all public,…
“Dude sounds like you have had a shit time I’m sorry for what has been done to you no one should go through that.” – Hayden Fletcher
“Beautifully said👌😊 all the best for a great recovery.” – Moneka Palmer“I am so sorry to see this has happened to you, definitely didn’t deserve that. I hope you have a speedy recovery and nothing but all good things comes your way.” – Cherish Rose
“All the best with your recovery and finding answers.” – Brooke Green
“hope you will be good to get back on your horse real soon good luck with your journey young fella” – Nychi Oconnor
These and many dozens of other comments just the same come from people who do not know that Jax is being honest. Even Jax isn’t sure if he’s being honest because he says he is suffering memory loss but it doesn’t stop him telling the story and seeking evidence. I made my own comment which was to reserve my judgement and sympathy until I could learn some more first. I wanted to test his hypothesis that a gang member identified him as a rival, ran him down, then set upon him in the street. I asked if he was, after all, a gang member. This is a man with extensive body tattoos and a “loud” Harley-Davidson and doubtless an appropriate riding costume to match. When you drive into a gang territory on a statement motorcycle decorated in war paint it issues a challenge to violence to those who consider it their territory.
Going by his own story the man had been provocative. He had more or less gone into Harlem with an ‘I hate Niggers’ sign strapped to him with similar predicted results as Samuel L. Jackson gave Bruce Willis in Die Hard with a Vengeance (1995.)
This is how memories get made. The traumatic photo of the wounded man, the crash, the violence, the accusations of malicious violence, the helicopters and hospitals, fire department, police, Westport gangland hits….that strikes the reader between the eyes in the picture Jax painted. The mind reels from this and searches for meaning. Well, meaning is on the menu right away. Jax provided it with his story of victimhood and as we have seen it was believed right away no questions asked. He also gave himself an out by saying he didn’t remember this himself and it was what someone else was telling him; If he needed a new story he could easily change and not be responsible for this one.
Into this I stepped and got my lesson in the power of The Primacy Effect. My questions upset people. I was going against the narrative they had swallowed hook, line, and sinker, about who the good man was here. Rather than be met with open minds I met with Jax’ story taken on a life of its own and animating dozens of keyboards like some poltergeist! One right away told me not to ask these questions but to be like the clones and ask ‘Are You OK?’…
“wow. Judgemental much? This poor man has gone through so much and your first comment is ‘are you not a gang member?’ He stated very clearly in his post that he has nothing to do with gangs. Tattooing is an art, just because he has decided to be the canvas for his art does not mean he is associated with gangs. And even if he was why does that mean you get to judge him just based off his tattoos? The real question should have been ‘are you okay’” – Morgan Barrett
“This poor man was attacked and is now left paralysed and with memory loss. How would you feel if you were in this situation and some rude man on the internet was blaming you for the attack?” – ibid
“This ain’t even the point, it’s your lack of compassion and empathy for someone who’s been severely attacked, and your first thing to do is blame him…. Fucking hell.” – Georgia Rose Tobeck
“wow just because he has tatts does NOT mean hes in a gang !! its ppl like you that have no idea on other ppls life story ! and its people like you who are the worst at spreading rumors and lies about others you have no idea about !!” – Nychi Oconnor
“that’s so nice of you to automatically stereotype someone based off of what they look like, specifically tattoos. Tattoos can be a form of self expression and art. Shut up.” – Kaytee Wright
“Your comment is judgmental and outdated Everyone has tattoos these days, bikes are for anyone who wants to ride not just gangs, Did you miss the part where he states not a gang member?” – Joe Bloggs
As you see, these correspondents have already fully absorbed the first story they have heard and are defending it. From their point of view the facts are now beyond dispute, questions to be put behind us, and if sympathetic emotions and good wishes are not being offered there’s something dysfunctional about me. They tried to contain the threat to their narrative not just because of this narrative but because to let this one go would undermine their entire process. How many other things in their lives would need to be re-evaluated if they gave up on this form of epistemology? How would they ever ‘think’ again unless by surrender to The Primacy Effect?
For the record, I never did say Jax wasn’t being truthful and I don’t know. Nor do I say he should have been attacked for his strong ‘come at me’ signals but I do say (as does he) that it’s a probable cause for an attack. However I don’t think it was an attack now. The more the conversation went on the more Jax became interested in dishing dirt on the other, unheard, side of this affair. By some connections he had secured their correspondence and shared screen shots trying to incriminate them. He showed that the wrecked car belonged to a mother whose partner and children were almost killed by Jax crashing into them. He said they were on drugs and revealed the man in the car he hit had Black Power affiliations (which is a far cry from Black Power putting out a hit on him.) At this point I stopped thinking this was a Die Hard/Gang provocation problem at all but really Jax trying to get his truth down first. I started thinking about the Primacy Effect and what a strong hold it has on uncritical thinkers.
Jax never said he was the one breaking road rules or that he was the one who ran into and destroyed a car or that it was full of children. Others do and the newspapers back that up. It seems possible, on the other hand of the story given, that Jax could equally be the bad guy here. If so I’m glad I didn’t jump the gun in fawning over his “artistic” tattoos and sympathising with his victimhood and being spiteful to the other party etc. Nearly everyone else did that and then Doubled Down when I didn’t conform.
People try to speak first because it works, because they have rightly gauged their audience as uncritical thinkers ready to believe the first thing they’re told. I don’t think like that and never have. I want to hear all sides and think hard before I make a choice. I want to be informed and I haven’t always understood that about myself compared to most others. Anarchists don’t come from Group Think sets. I’ve never thought it important to speak first or last or emotively because I didn’t want to convince uncritical people. It didn’t occur to me in the past that order mattered when making speeches or speaking to teachers or parents or even police and judges. I suffered from the ‘Fallacy of Consensus’ in thinking others were like me in this way. Today’s heavy thinking has taken me further out of that fallacy.
One friend told me of a man he knew who tried to get out of trouble with the police by implicating others in drug use with him. My critical thinking friend tried to tell him that it wouldn’t stop them investigating him but only give them MORE dirt on him! But he didn’t get that because of his false idea about how to play influence. This also involved getting in first to frame up a story as to benefit from Primacy. Usually it worked for him.
Another friend told me that as kids her sister always ran to the parents first and dropped her version of an altercation down. The uncritical parents always sided with the kid who came to them first and didn’t wait for another side to the story. In that ‘market’ it’s natural that a kid would adopt the urge for Primacy because it would never fail to succeed for them. The other kid, my friend, was disinherited by fortune over and over again but instead inherited something else because of this- truth-seeking.
How many decisions get made, and made badly, by voters and juries and police and citizens this way? How often does a politician get their way because they make their mark first and scoop up the ‘truthyness’ of the Primacy Effect? How often does the media select among narratives to set down in print the one that pays their interests and in so doing make that the new ‘truth’? Certainly the ‘One Source of Truth’ about the Covid Pandemic and the response to it felt like that.
It’s another way to think more clearly by realising that people cannot reason their way out of what they were not reasoned into. And, that there are so many people who live in that state right now.
—
Like Comment Share
