Mistakes Were Made (but Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts
More product info
From Carol Tavris
Refresh the report to view the most up-to-date data available:
Note: We only analyze "reviews" and ignore one-tap "ratings".
Report Card











Most Trusted Reviews
TRUST
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Verified Purchaser
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Critical Reviewer (avg. rating: 4.2)
Least Trusted Reviews
TRUST
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Unverified Purchaser
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Contains repetitive phrases (
show)
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Never-Verified Reviewer
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Take-Back Reviewer (1 deleted Review; avg. rating: 5.0)
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Overrepresented Participation (posted 9 Reviews)
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Easy Grader (avg. rating: 5.0)
Analysis Details

We discovered a total of 130 deleted Reviews for this product, with an average rating of 4.6. Even though deleted reviews don't affect the average rating, the fact that action was taken to delete reviews raises some red flags about the integrity of the reviews for the product as whole.
There are a few limitations to keep in mind regarding the Deleted Reviews test:
- We don't have a magic ability to collect every single deleted review; we can only identify reviews as deleted if we collect them on one date and then notice they are no longer visible on a subsequent date.
- We have no information on reviews that were never published in the first place.
- We also don't know why these reviews were removed. It could be action from the platform, personal decision by the review author, part of an entire account closure, even some data error on our part, etc.

(4.8/5)
(3.0/5)
(4.3/5)
(4.1/5)
(4.7/5)
(5.0/5)
(3.5/5)
(4.6/5)
(4.4/5)
84 of the 365 total reviews for this product use substantial repetitive phrases between them. These reviewers have rated this product an average of 4.6 while reviews without substantial repetitive phrases rated this product an average of 4.4. Based on our statistical modeling, the discrepancy in average rating between these two groups is significant enough to believe that the difference is not due to random chance, and may indicate that there are unnatural reviews.

Take-Back Reviewers
128 of the 365 reviewers have had at least one of their past reviews for another product deleted. While this is more Take-Back Reviewers than we'd expect to see, it does not appear to have a significant impact on the overall rating.

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- 52%
- From reviewers with an overrepresented participation
We see the following 2 participation groups with a statistically significant greater concentration than what we'd expect to see:In total, we found that 189 reviewers (or 52%) are within an overrepresented participation group. This is an excessively high number of reviewers in overrepresented participation groups.

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- 1%
- Created over 1 day
We counted 365 reviews for this product over the span of 4,870 days, an average of 0.1 reviews per day. If these reviews were created randomly, there would be a 99.9% chance that we would see 2 or fewer reviews on any given day.
However, we see the following 1 day exceeding this threshold:In total, we found that 3 reviews were created on just 1 day. This is within an acceptable range and it does not appear to be significantly affecting the overall rating for this product.

110 of the 365 total reviews for this product are unverified purchases. This is within an acceptable range and it does not appear to be significantly affecting the overall rating for this product.
Unverified purchases may be the result of Kindle Unlimited readers, buyers who didn't pay full price, or reviewers who did not purchase the product at Amazon. Read more about our Unverified Purchases test.

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- 0%
- Have an overrepresented word count
Read more about our Word Count Comparison test.

5% also reviewed:
Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That... by Dr. Dan Ariely
4% also reviewed:
Outliers, The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell
4% also reviewed:
Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman
3% also reviewed:
Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking by Malcolm Gladwell
2% also reviewed:
The Power of Habit (Turtleback School &... by Charles Duhigg
2% also reviewed:
A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something... by Lawrence M. Krauss
2% also reviewed:
You Are Not So Smart: Why You Have Too Many... by David McRaney
2% also reviewed:
Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol S. Dweck PhD
from the same brand
62 of the 365 reviewers have substantial overlapping product review history. This is within an acceptable range and it does not appear to be significantly affecting the overall rating for this product.

4.3 Product's Average Ease Score
4.3 Category's Average Ease Score
Read more about our Reviewer Ease test.

Brand Repeaters
3 of the 365 reviewers have reviewed other products for this brand. This is within an acceptable range and it does not appear to be significantly affecting the overall rating for this product.

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- 0%
- Admitted to receiving an incentive
Read more about our Incentivized Reviews test. Check out our study showing that Incentivized Reviewers are much more likely to leave a positive review.