throw_somewhere t1_j1tju9v wrote on December 27, 2022 at 7:30 AM

Reply to comment by jrm19941994 in [OC] Women face greater Imposter Syndrome than Men, when starting Software Engineering Degrees, despite having similar high school averages by GeorgeDaGreat123

Ironically enough, I'm neurotic as fuck but don't feel Imposter Syndrome. I have very average abilities and I don't pretend I'm any more skilled than that. Anyone that hires me is agreeing to take on a self-proclaimed mediocre worker, that's their fault!

Tbh I figure that a pre-requisite to Imposter Syndrome is some form of dishonesty, usually social posturing I'd guess. How else are people being fooled if you are not the one fooling them? It doesn't work if you say "Oh, no, it's just that they're wrong about me, making undue assumptions about my abilities etc." So, they're hedging their bets on you performing well, completely unfounded and detached from reality and any observable behaviors? Looks like we're all idiots, then, and you are no outlier.

nocuzzlikeyea13 t1_j1xa0wk wrote on December 28, 2022 at 2:04 AM

I think this is a pretty poor understanding of imposter syndrome. Imposter syndrome is the belief that your achievements were lucky, like "I scored an 800 on my SAT by random chance/because I'm a good test taker/etc, but this says nothing about my ability to do well in college." So then they believe they by luck got placed in the wrong class and don't deserve to be there. This is exacerbated by people treating them inconsistently, sometimes from direct discrimination, other times from unconscious bias. They feel a kind of survivor's guilt, that breeds shame, that breeds imposter syndrome.