I think people aren’t aware enough of survivorship bias. Or, at least, even amongst people who are aware of it, I think it is hard to notice.

It comes up a lot in group situations: Companies, communities, cultures, any other assemblage of people. This is because any group of people is composed solely of the ones who did not leave the group, so any observation you make about the group is only made about the survivors.

This is particularly important when people tell you that you’ll just get used to something.

There’s a great explanation from Julia Evans (via Dan Luu) of normalization of deviance:

new person joins

new person: WTF WTF WTF WTF WTF

old hands: yeah we know we’re concerned about it

new person: WTF WTF wTF wtf wtf w…

new person gets used to it

new person #2 joins

new person #2: WTF WTF WTF WTF

new person: yeah we know. we’re concerned about it.

This is absolutely a thing that happens, but I think there’s another form:

new person joins

new person: WTF WTF WTF WTF WTF

old hands: yeah we know we’re concerned about it

new person: WTF WTF WTF WT- actually bugger this for a game of soldiers

new person leaves

new person #2 joins

new person #2: WTF WTF WTF WTF

old hands: yeah we know. we’re concerned about it.

A big problem is that if you are new person #2 you cannot tell which scenario you are in, because of survivorship bias: Either way you are going to be surrounded by people who got used to it.

It’s hard to know what to do about this, but I offer two small pieces of advice:

If you’re the new person: It’s OK to leave. The fact that however many people seem to have got used to it doesn’t mean that it’s actually sensible to try to get used to it.

If you’re the old hands: Consider what aspects of your culture arise this way. Are most people really getting used to it, or is it just that the people who didn’t get used to it left?