“Oh, he is a DGIT!”I was chatting with a jumper a few days ago and the term DGIT came up. A DGIT is a “Dead Guy In Training”. In other words, a jumper whose attitude and behavior suggests to other skydivers that he or she is highly likely to experience serious injury or death. Let’s be clear…. ANY of us can have a high-risk incident at any time. The DGIT, however, is at higher risk than other jumpers because of a combination of attitude, skill, attitude, experience, and attitude. There are three basic elements to a DGIT: a distorted self-image, a desire to aggressively push limits, and an inability to learn vicariously. The distorted self-image manifests as a belief that he or she is more skilled than the evidence supports. This has been named the “Dunning-Kruger effect”. As described by Dunning and Kruger, people often fail to perceive their own lack of competence and believe that they are much more competent than others. The DGIT almost always believes that they have “mad skilz” despite lack of evidence of these skills.The DGIT is frequently pushing the limits of his/her competence in ways that are dangerous. Of course, none of us grow in skill without pushing our limits. However, there are safe ways, and unsafe ways to do this. Investing in good coaching, taking the time to become REALLY competent at our present level, and taking on only one new thing at a time (not stacking risks), all help to make it possible to push our limits safely.Lastly, and possibly the most interesting, is that the DGIT has great difficulty learning vicariously. He or she learns well only from direct, personal experience. This is a REALLY dangerous way to learn skydiving. The rules of skydiving are written in blood. We don’t need to repeat the errors of others to learn the lessons from their mistakes. The DGIT can’t or won’t learn from the errors of others, and is doomed to repeat many of the same mistakes. Unfortunately, the price of learning this way can be VERY high. So what to do about this? If you are a DGIT… you are very unlikely to recognize yourself in this article and even less likely to take any advice I give here. If you know a DGIT, be wary of being an “innocent victim”. Do your best to avoid putting yourself in the path of the DGIT’s actions. If you are in a position to guide the DGIT, gently try to steer them in the right direction. This guidance is often best done by asking rather than telling.This sport is dangerous enough without adding risks by having a poor attitude. Doorrr!rationalwiki.org/wiki/Dunning-Kruger_effect
Posted on: Fri, 18 Jul 2014 18:13:46 +0000
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