Ideas for modern living: inside out

It's a paradox: what successful women feel inside doesn't always reflect their effect on the outside world

Know thyself, Plato instructed us 2,500 years ago. Most of us don't, of course, and women are experts at a certain type of self-deception. Decades of studies show that women are more likely than men to underestimate their influence, and this mismatch between how they feel and their effect on the outside world creates a jarring paradox. Though they can be spectacularly competent – not only to observers but on tests of their skills – successful women often feel like imposters.

When Susan Vinnicombe and Val Singh of Cranfield University interviewed senior executives, they discovered remarkably similar career paths among the men and women. Yet the women were more likely to doubt themselves and the appeal of risky ventures. "I was not at all happy about making this move, although it was a promotion. I didn't know what it would entail," said one female director who took the leap under duress. American psychologists Joyce Ehrlinger and David Dunning found that women who thought they had made errors on a quiz (though they had actually aced it) declined to enter another competition. Their skewed self-perception didn't affect their performance. But it affected how eager they were to step up to the plate next time.

Yet even if men, on average, have higher levels of self-esteem, it's neither a prerequisite for success nor always a force for good. Cheaters, bullies and self-appointed enforcers have strong egos, while teenagers with the most self-confidence are early adopters of unprotected sex, drugs and drinking to excess. So why try to boost your self-image to match how other people view you? Self-knowledge is linked to happiness, which for Plato is no paradox at all.

Susan Pinker is author of The Sexual Paradox: Men, Women and The Real Gender Gap (Atlantic, £8.99). Visit