Twaddle Tendency is one of Charlie Munger’s psychological tendencies: the pressure people feel to keep talking, or give a confident answer, even with little real substance to offer.
The idea
Munger included Twaddle Tendency in his “Psychology of Human Misjudgment” speech as a caution about how much verbal output, in speeches, meetings, and commentary, is generated to fill time or meet an expectation of a response rather than because the speaker has something well-founded to say. An audience’s demand for an answer does not guarantee a good answer exists, but the social pressure to respond produces one anyway.
When to use it
- Noticing a confident answer supplied mainly because a question was asked, not because evidence supports it
- Evaluating pundits, forecasters, or advisors expected to have an opinion on everything
- Choosing who to listen to: people who withhold an opinion until it’s earned are worth more than those who always have one ready
- Reviewing your own output for filler that sounds substantive but adds no information
How to apply it
- Before answering, check whether you actually know, or are just filling the silence.
- Prefer “I don’t know” or a narrower, well-supported answer over a broad, confident one.
- Surround yourself with people who hold back an opinion until it’s earned.
- When evaluating someone else’s answer, separate how confidently it was delivered from how much evidence backs it.
Watch out for
Twaddle is easy to produce and easy to reward — audiences often prefer a confident answer to an honest “I don’t know,” reinforcing the tendency in exactly the people whose word carries the most weight.
Related models
- Excessive Self-Regard — a related tendency that inflates confidence in one’s own answers.
- Authority Misinfluence — why twaddle from a credentialed source is especially persuasive.
- Lollapalooza — the effect when several such tendencies, including twaddle, combine.
Sources
Charlie Munger, “The Psychology of Human Misjudgment” (speech, 1995, later published in Poor Charlie’s Almanack), and popularized in later summaries of Munger’s tendencies such as Shane Parrish’s Farnam Street guide.