Education in Indian Scenario- Cognitive errors!

Source- The Better India

• By Education, I mean that quality of academic practice which gives the learner the capacity to recognize its full potential. Therefore it lets bloom learner's capabilities for the highest level of productivity and self satisfaction.
• By cognitive error, I mean the strong belief system that makes you think in a contrary way to the much different reality. Because of cognitive errors we end up thinking something that is totally out of context or opposite to it. For instance- “Science is the only field that offers best career options.”
• Indian Scenario, means that irrespective of the geographical location, born and brought up on the Indian Sub-continent, the general social setup which usually prefers one and only of way of life. Hence they ignore and discredit other forms and styles of living and thoughts.

With this explanation, now the reader surely has grasped the direction in which I am trying to point regarding education! So, let us begin our try for looking into the effects of these cognitive errors!

THE CONFLICTS IN CHOOSING EDUCATIONAL FIELDS-

I ponder how many of my readers would agree that after qualifying matriculation, we were unsure about the stream and subjects. They were chosen over which the rest of our lives were apparently etched!

Majority of the youth in their 20’s in Indian scenario have faced this argument that pure science stream has the best prospects. Why? “Because you can opt for engineering or you can be a medical professional one day beta!”. Therefore it is a belief that these are the only existent respectable professions!

Sharing a personal experience, I remember telling one of my cousins that I got psychology Honors. I was quite happy. However, she asked with a sarcastic smile, “It is arts right? Clarifying myself that it is bachelors of Science degree, I hear her say, “This subject is also a science now?!”

In my opinion, the obvious cognitive error behind such sarcasm is that “Science means Mathematics, Chemistry, Physics, and Biology only”. All other subjects are either arts or commerce category for majority.

Such lack of insight is probably because majority is supposedly having the tendency to follow classic specimen. Like the herd of cattle!

Paucity of insight exists. No field is bereft of its own kind of science. In other words it's a fact that be it chemistry/psychology, it's is a complete science in it self that needs a rigorous analysis for reaching specialization.

INDIAN SCENARIO AND ITS RIGIDITY

In addition to the above, as a social science student, I am proposing the following hypothetical conditions-

• Majority of the Indian readers of Storentrep were in psychological pressure to take up science in higher secondary, or
• Majority of the Indian teen readers of Storentrep were demoralized by someone in the social setup for choosing arts or commerce stream for future prospects.

Also read :IQ, Politics, COVID-19 and Indian suffering- A close analysis.

Firstly, there can be hundreds of such hypotheses that I can form. Secondly, my confident subjectivity anticipates the findings to support that which I am expecting as the social reality. If I conduct a survey today, I am 99 percent confident that my prediction would come out to be true.

There are movies like “The 3 Idiots” where the main character has already given a huge social message. Parents need to think that their child’s career is not over if he/she is not having science as a stream.

EFFECTS OF COGNITIVE ERRORS AND REMEDY

Source- www.momababyetc.com

Even after such messages, what has changed out there in social setup? Let’s jot down some of the facts, for instance-

• Immense parental pressure forces children to choose subjects of disinterest adding to their confusion.
• Students can’t understand the material completely they are reading all throughout the year.
• Their actual interests and aspirations are suppressing under the burden of this somewhat alien subject which they don’t have the aptitude to even decipher.
• Lack of insight in the subject matter in combination with parental pressure and competitiveness to perform well results in-
  • Depression
  • Anxiety
  • Exam phobia
  • Inability to manage time
  • Reduced social interaction
  • Lack of social confidence
  • Lowering grades
  • Ultimate failure
  • Unfortunate steps for suicide
• For the rest of their lives, these children grow up as anxious adults to trying to fit in and live an identity expected by social elders and guides(who eventually die with time)
• All this leaves us a future, with forever unsatisfied and mournful young adults, unhappy for the loss of actual productivity they were capable of, but couldn’t choose for themselves!

Questions left for the reader- Where are we heading? What are we creating? What is the purpose of education? Individuality and individual differences in humans matter, or are we too, just a herd of cattle?

Conclusion- until, False belief or cognitive errors are going to run man towards a mirage unattainable, true education remains mirage unattainable!

Article By: -

Annu Biswas