Two forms of intellectual humility have opposite links to mental health, study finds

A recent paper published in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin provides evidence that the way people experience intellectual humility is linked to their mental health in contrasting ways. The research suggests that valuing the knowledge of other people tends to be associated with greater life satisfaction, but focusing heavily on one’s own intellectual flaws is linked to lower well-being. These findings indicate that not all forms of intellectual humility affect a person’s quality of life in the same positive manner.

Intellectual humility is broadly understood as the recognition that one’s beliefs and opinions might be wrong. People tend to highly value this trait in others. It builds trust, fosters open-mindedness, and helps bridge divides in social and political conversations.

“There has been tons of research on how intellectual humility might help people to think better,” said Michael Prinzing, a research and assessment scholar at Wake Forest University. “But there has been almost none on how intellectual humility might impact a person’s well-being, which is surprising given that this has major implications for its status as an intellectual virtue.”

Prinzing noted conflicting theoretical perspectives on the matter. “I saw some reasons to predict a positive relationship,” Prinzing said. “For example, intellectual humility might help people to get along better with others, especially those with whom they disagree.”

“Social interactions and relationships are hugely important for well-being, so intellectual humility might be good for well-being,” Prinzing added. Psychological theories also propose that recognizing one’s own ignorance might actually threaten emotional health, as lingering uncertainty about important beliefs can create distress.

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“But there were also reasons to predict a negative relationship,” Prinzing said. “People are unnerved by threats to their beliefs and rely on relatively fixed cognitive schemas to make sense of their lives. So, if intellectual humility destabilizes those, then it could be bad for well-being.”

To resolve this contradiction, psychologists and philosophers often split this concept into two distinct categories. Prinzing noticed this division when reviewing the psychological literature. “I started to realize that all of the reasons to expect a positive relationship had to do with other-focused aspects of intellectual humility, whereas all the reasons to expect a negative relationship had to do with self-focused aspects,” Prinzing said.

The first category, metacognitive intellectual humility, involves a person thinking about their own thinking. “Some people understand intellectual humility in terms of how one thinks about one’s own thinking (i.e., meta-cognition),” Prinzing said. “It’s about recognizing the limits of one’s knowledge and being aware of one’s fallibility.”

The second category is interpersonal intellectual humility, which focuses on how a person views the minds of others. “But intellectual humility can also be understood interpersonally, as involving a kind of respectfulness towards other people and their ideas, recognizing others’ intellectual strengths and treating them as potential sources of insight,” Prinzing explained. “So, I started to think that maybe these two aspects of intellectual humility pull in opposite directions.”

To explore these relationships, the authors first analyzed data from a supplemental cross-sectional study using 596 college students and 527 adults. This initial test suggested that interpersonal intellectual humility was linked to fewer symptoms of depression and anxiety. Metacognitive intellectual humility showed no such benefits in this early test.

To confirm these initial patterns, the scientists launched their first main study with 400 adults from the United States. They matched this sample to national demographics regarding age, sex, and race using an online research platform. Participants completed a series of standardized questionnaires presented in a randomized order.

To measure metacognitive intellectual humility, respondents rated their agreement with statements like, “I question my own opinions, positions, and viewpoints because they could be wrong.” To measure interpersonal intellectual humility, they responded to items such as, “I am willing to learn from others.”

The scientists also measured different facets of mental health using established clinical and psychological scales. They assessed hedonic well-being, which refers to pleasant feelings like joy and contentment, using a standardized scale of positive and negative experiences. They measured eudaimonic well-being, which relates to a person’s sense of meaning, potential, and purpose, using a specialized questionnaire about meaning in life judgments. They also screened for symptoms of depression and anxiety.

The data revealed opposite patterns for the two types of humility. Higher levels of interpersonal intellectual humility were associated with more pleasant feelings, a stronger sense of meaning in life, and fewer symptoms of depression and anxiety. In contrast, higher levels of metacognitive intellectual humility were associated with fewer pleasant feelings, a weaker sense of meaning, and higher levels of anxiety and depression.

The researchers even tested for curvilinear associations. This statistical method checks whether a moderate amount of a trait is optimal, testing the idea that too much or too little humility might be harmful. They found no evidence for this effect. The linear relationships held firm regardless of demographic factors like age, income, and education level.

To build on these findings, the scientists designed a two-year longitudinal study involving a much larger sample. This design allowed them to track trajectories of change over time. The sample included 2,526 college students drawn from 14 different colleges and universities across the United States. Participants completed surveys at four separate time points, answering similar questions about intellectual humility, meaning in life, depression, and anxiety.

The longitudinal data confirmed the initial observations. When comparing different individuals, those who scored higher in interpersonal intellectual humility tended to report more meaning in life and fewer symptoms of depression and anxiety. The researchers also looked at changes within individual participants over the two-year period. They found that as a person’s interpersonal intellectual humility increased above their usual baseline, their sense of meaning in life grew, and their depression symptoms decreased.

The opposite pattern emerged for the self-focused type of humility. Between individuals, people who displayed higher metacognitive intellectual humility generally reported a lower sense of meaning in life and more symptoms of depression and anxiety. Within individuals, times of heightened metacognitive intellectual humility were associated with increased feelings of depression and anxiety.

Using complex mathematical models to track growth over the two years, the researchers found that people who started with higher interpersonal intellectual humility tended to start with higher well-being. Those who experienced the largest increases in interpersonal intellectual humility also experienced the largest drops in depression. Changes in metacognitive intellectual humility over time did not correspond with any improvements in mental health.

“The results of these studies consistently supported that prediction,” Prinzing told PsyPost. “Whereas the interpersonal form of intellectual humility was consistently associated with better well-being, the self-focused, metacognitive form was associated with worse well-being.”

Because the studies relied on observational data, the authors note that it is not possible to prove a direct cause-and-effect relationship. It is possible that experiencing poor mental health causes people to focus more heavily on their intellectual flaws. However, the researchers argue that the reverse is less likely. It is hard to imagine a theoretical reason why feelings of joy and life satisfaction would cause a person to suddenly respect others more while simultaneously questioning their own beliefs less.

Another potential limitation is the reliance on self-reported questionnaires. Assessing one’s own metacognition requires a person to evaluate their own thought processes. This kind of mental gymnastics can be very difficult for people to do accurately. Future research might benefit from using objective tests to measure how people actually process information, rather than relying solely on how they perceive their own thinking.

These findings raise interesting philosophical and practical questions. Historically, virtues are defined as character traits that promote human flourishing. If recognizing one’s own intellectual flaws actually harms a person’s mental health, it invites debate over whether this specific type of humility should be considered a virtue at all.

Practically, these results suggest that efforts to encourage intellectual humility in society might need to shift focus. “With rampant societal polarization, people are eager to promote intellectual humility, thinking that this might help ease the tension,” Prinzing said.

However, he noted that focusing on personal flaws might backfire. “I share that eagerness, but these findings suggest that there can be a downside to promoting intellectual humility, at least when considering the kind of intellectual humility that involves focusing on one’s fallibility and the limits of one’s knowledge,” Prinzing added.

“Metacognitive intellectual humility does not feel good, and increasing it could lead to inadvertent reductions in mental health and well-being,” Prinzing said. “This raises some potential ethical concerns about encouraging others to be metacognitively intellectually humble.”

Instead, encouraging people to appreciate the knowledge of others might be an easier and healthier habit to build. “Relatedly, the findings suggest that people are more likely to follow through on intentions to cultivate interpersonal versus metacognitive intellectual humility,” Prinzing explained. “Prior research shows that new behaviors are more likely to become habitual if they are accompanied by positive emotions.”

“If people tend to experience lower levels of well-being when exercising metacognitive intellectual humility, then they are less likely to persist with it,” Prinzing said. “However, if people tend to experience better well-being when exercising interpersonal intellectual humility, then they are more likely to persist.”

“This means that encouraging people to engage with others in a way that respects their ideas and treats them as potential sources of knowledge and insight is both comparatively more likely to be effective and less ethically complicated,” Prinzing said.

The study, “Metacognitive and Interpersonal Intellectual Humility Are Asymmetrically Associated with Well-Being,” was authored by Michael M. Prinzing, Shauna M. Bowes, Karen Melton, Perry Glanzer, and Sarah Schnitker.