Diddy and Donny: Birds of a Feather

In keeping with my belief born from my studies of human behavior over decades, we gravitate to the familiar.

Familiarity Effect is a cognitive phenomenon that makes humans more likely to favor familiar things over unfamiliar things. This means that by becoming more familiar with a person, place, object, or idea, you will naturally become more likely to favor it over alternatives.

This well known tenet in psych applies to friendships, career choices, intimate relationships and parenting styles. We gravitate to that which feels familiar, comfortable, tribal.

As the Diddy crisis peaks over time, the names associated with him intimately may surprise folks. But not me. If you’re a gangster at heart, you will align yourself with gangster types because they’re familiar. If you were victimized in your childhood, you will align yourself with not only other victims, but also perpetrators. Why? Both are familiar to you. For women, this can mean that even though they swore they would never be attracted to a man like dad, provided dad was a jerk, they will but won’t know it till later. Why? Because perpetrators tend to be slick and appear quite different from ‘dad’ until enough time passing tells the other story.

Diddy’s dad was a gangster, killed when he tried to pull a fast one on a member of his tribe. Donny’s dad was a gangster too, all dressed up in his white collar crimes.

Without role models to demonstrate a different path? Kids gravitate to the familiar. Boys watching their moms get whacked around will grow up doing the same to their significant others. Girls groomed to be a victims throughout childhood will take the blows, likely much like mom did.

Unless troubled kids are mentored by adults demonstrating a different pathway through life, they grow up to be a version of their parents simply because we gravitate to the familiar.

#HumanNature