Perfectionists tend to determine their self-worth based on their ability to achieve unrealistically high standards. As a consequence, they may focus on information in their environment that they interpret as evidence that they are not achieving and criticise themselves harshly when they fail to meet their standards. Such patterns of thinking serve to maintain the importance of attaining extremely high standards.
Biased Information Processing
The way we make sense of what goes on around us plays a big part in maintaining perfectionism. Since there is so much happening in our environment at any one time, our brains choose what we pay attention to and how we make sense of things. We tend to pay attention to and interpret things according to what we expect. Since achieving extremely high standards provides the basis for a perfectionist's self-worth, they tend to pay careful attention to any evidence that they take to mean that they are not achieving. For example, if a perfectionist believes "I must never make mistakes", they will probably quickly pick up errors in their work that other people may not notice.
Perfectionists also tend to interpret information in a way that demonstrates that they are not achieving. They often have an extreme view of what success and failure is, with no middle ground. For example, they may say missing out on an A for this assignment means that I might as well have failed".
Self-Criticism and Unhelpful Thinking
Perfectionists tend to be extremely self-critical, especially if they are unable to meet their high standards. They might say to themselves: "I am such an idiot" or "I should have done better". This self-criticism can cause people to feel a range of negative emotions including anger, anxiety, depression and guilt.
Often these negative thoughts reflect an unhelpful style of thinking such as:
- Black & white thinking: seeing only extremes – no shades of grey.
- Overcompensating : putting unreasonable demands on self and others.
- Catastrophising: blowing things out of proportion.
- Jumping to conclusions: assuming that we know what others are thinking or can predict the future.
How Biased Information Processing and Unhelpful Thinking Maintain Perfectionism
When people repeatedly focus on information in their environment that is consistent with their beliefs and ignore information that does not fit with their beliefs, it can appear as if their beliefs are well supported. Likewise, a person may perceive that there is a lot of support for their beliefs if they repeatedly interpret information in a way that is consistent with their beliefs.
When perfectionists pay attention only to evidence that they are not achieving or interpret neutral information as showing that they are not achieving, they tend to feel bad about themselves. For the perfectionist, this then underlines the importance of striving to achieve, thereby keeping their perfectionism going.
Perfectionists' repeated criticism of themselves not only causes them to feel uncomfortable emotions, it also emphasises the importance of achieving their unrealistically high standards. The negative thinking styles that they rely on cause them to place unreasonable pressures on themselves, see only the extremes and not accurately perceive situations. Such negative thinking styles underlie perfectionists' unreasonable standards and harsh self-criticism.
Reducing Unhelpful Thinking
One way to check out the accuracy of perfectionistic thoughts and find more helpful and balanced ways of thinking is to use a thought diary.
Thought Diaries- Thought diaries are designed to help you become aware of your negative thoughts and notice how these thoughts affect how you feel and behave. Thought diaries can also help you investigate the accuracy and helpfulness of your negative thoughts and develop new more balanced thoughts
A hallmark of perfectionism is the tendency to judge your self-worth largely on your ability to achieve high standards. To meet their unrelenting high standards, perfectionists tend to engage in a number of perfectionism behaviours (e.g., repeatedly checking work for mistakes), which may serve to maintain perfectionistic beliefs.
Perfectionism Behaviours
Perfectionism behaviours can be divided into two categories - the things you actively do as a result of your perfectionism and the things you avoid doing as a result of your perfectionism
Perfectionism Active Behaviours
Most perfectionists engage in actions aimed at reaching the unrelenting standards they have set for themselves, and perhaps others. They are so concerned about reaching these high standards that they engage in behaviours that they see as necessary but that often seem excessive to other people. Examples include:
- Excessive checking,
- Excessive organising,
- List making,
- Correcting others.
Perfectionism Avoidance Behaviours
Many perfectionists also attempt to meet their unrelenting standards and avoid 'failure' by avoiding doing tasks. Although this may not seem like perfectionism, it is really the other side of the same coin as engaging in actions aimed at meeting your unrelenting standards. When perfectionists fear that they will not be able to reach their high standards, they may be too afraid of failure to try. Some may procrastinate by putting off a task, often indefinitely, while others will wait to the last minute before doing a task. Other examples include:
- Giving up too soon,
- Indecisiveness,
- Avoiding tasks, you fear you are unable to do adequately.
How these Behaviours Maintain Perfectionism
Perfectionism behaviours keep you from learning whether or not your perfectionistic beliefs are true. For example, a person who has difficulty delegating tasks to colleagues may hold the belief that this is necessary to maintain their high standards in the workplace. Continuing to not delegate work, the perfectionist is unable to test our whether their beliefs are accurate.
Perfectionism Behaviours can also be problematic in that: they are often time consuming: they are sometime done at the expense of other important activities: they can impair relationships: and sometimes can actually interfere with attempts to meet the standard set
Reducing Perfectionism Behaviours
One way to test the accuracy of perfectionistic beliefs is to see what happens when you behave differently.
Stepladders Towards Change
- Choose a specific goal behaviour to change,
- Break the goal down into small steps by changing who is there, what you do, when you do it, where you do it, and how long you do it for.
- Complete each step, one at a time, beginning with the least difficult and working your way up.
- Do a step frequently and repeatedly, to make sure you are comfortable with it before you move on.
Behavioural Experiments
Behavioural Experiments help loosen the grip of your perfectionism and test out the accuracy of your perfectionistic beliefs by seeing what happens when you change your perfectionism behaviours.
We encourage you to try reducing your perfectionism behaviours. You may be pleasantly surprised at how much more time you have, and how little it affects your performance!