Researchers suggest that deliberate ignorance can be advantageous in some situations

In 1961, the Berlin Wall was built by communist East Germany, claiming to prevent West Germans from infiltrating the country. However, it was more effective at stopping East Germans from defecting. Günter Grass, a renowned German novelist, openly criticized the wall and was subsequently shadowed by the Stasi, East German secret police who referred to him as "Bolzen" or Bolt. At the fall of the Berlin Wall and Germany's reunification, the Stasi files were made public, and it was widely believed that people would want to read their files and find out if a file on them existed. This, however, was not the case for many people living in former East Germany.

A survey conducted by Ralph Hertwig, a cognitive psychologist and decision scientist and historian Dagmar Ellerbrock found that more people chose not to read their files than those who did. In an unpublished survey of over 2,300 residents of former East Germany, it was discovered that people chose to remain ignorant deliberately. In a new paper, the team surveyed 134 former East Germans who did not want to read their files to better understand their rationale. The survey of 134 participants revealed that more than three-quarters of the group found the information irrelevant as it could not be changed or revisited. In effect, by denying the Stasi their story, many East Germans chose their own veil of ignorance to protect themselves and others, stripping the regime of its power.

The East German regime controlled many aspects of people’s lives, deciding if someone could go to university, get a person fired from their job without explanation, and even arrest people in stealth. The rationale behind the survey's findings aligns with other studies that show that under certain conditions, deliberate ignorance about certain matters also has merit.

Imagine having to create a society from scratch, but with a hitch. You know nothing about yourself, such as your gender, economic status, nationality, education level, or even appearance. U.S. philosopher John Rawls developed this thought experiment in his 1971 book A Theory of Justice to show how operating behind a 'veil of ignorance’ could lead to a fairer society. Placing music directors behind a shield during auditions led to significantly more women gaining a seat in symphony orchestras.

While knowledge is commonly associated with being beneficial or desirable, a veil of ignorance, as demonstrated in East Germany, can be used as a means to protect oneself and strip the authorities of their power.

After the fall of East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic, or GDR, people were given access to the files kept on them by the East German secret police, the Stasi. But many chose not to read them. Researchers surveyed 134 individuals to find out why, offering 15 reasons. Here are the top 10 listed by percentage of individuals who cited each one.

The findings enhance a growing body of work by psychologists to understand when and why people choose to seek knowledge or, conversely, to remain ignorant.

In a study posted in January 2020 in Nature Human Behaviour, researchers suggested that people consider three specific questions: How useful is the information? How will the information make me feel? And does the information gel with my world view?

Those questions can help explain people’s decisions not to view their Stasi files, says study coauthor and cognitive neuroscientist Tali Sharot of the University College London. For one, the information was no longer useful or relevant once the East German regime fell. And the information in the files had a high likelihood of containing information that would make people feel bad. Knowing, in other words, felt more harmful than not knowing. 

Rob MacCoun, a psychologist and law professor at Stanford University, likens the decision to people deciding not to get genetic testing for diseases with no cure. “Both cases suggest that there are situations in which people intuit that learning something will lead them down a path they don’t want to walk. It is a kind of mental hygiene,” he says, “and maybe there’s some wisdom in that.” 

For Sharot and many researchers studying deliberate ignorance, focusing on situations where ignorance represents a poor choice, rather than a worthy one, is the more pressing area of inquiry.

For instance, when people actively avoid information that might conflict with their view of the world, they can create dangerous echo chambers. “If someone is skeptical of climate change, they may not go out and seek information that suggests climate change is real,” Sharot says. But that ignorance imperils the health of the planet.

Research also shows that 10 percent of people who take an HIV test never come back for the results. Such individuals probably choose ignorance out of fear, but they also put others at risk of contracting the disease, Sharot says.

Tweaking the message, when it comes to medical information, overcomes people’s desire not to know, Sharot’s unpublished work suggests. She and her team wanted to see how to get more people to receive potentially scary information on their predisposition for certain genetic diseases.

One group of study participants was told that the additional information would help them take precautionary measures to ward off a given disease’s onset. Another group received a more neutral message. Those receiving the helpful message were more likely than others to overcome their fears and agree to receive such information.

Hertwig agrees this research is essential. But digging into instances where ignorance makes sense, and no change in behavior is needed, also has important implications, he says. The study of East Germans, for instance, provides clues about how societies handle periods of political upheaval. Across time, societies have had to grapple with how to move on from oppressive regimes. Should the leaders of a new regime make all former leaders and informants atone for their sins? Or should they mostly put the past behind them and move on?

“There is no simple answer to the question,” Hertwig says. What makes sense in one society may not make sense in another.

In the case of the Stasi files, people’s decision to ignore information en masse was a way of taking power away from their former tormentors, Hertwig says, allowing citizens in the reunified Germany to build a new and more peaceful future.

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