CONFIDENCE² Project: Better Understanding and Measuring Confidence in Our Own Judgments

Are we able to accurately assess our own abilities? Why do we sometimes tend to overestimate them, or conversely, to underestimate them?

Funded by the French National Research Agency (ANR) with a grant of 392,710 euros, the CONFIDENCE² project aims to better understand the different forms of confidence and overconfidence. In particular, it seeks to determine whether these different dimensions reflect the same phenomenon or distinct characteristics, and whether they remain stable over time. To answer these questions, the researchers will conduct a survey of a representative sample of 3,000 people in France. They will study the links between confidence, economic behaviour, individual characteristics and mental health, and will test interventions to improve our ability to assess our own performance.

Coordinated by Sébastien Massoni, Professor of Economics at the University of Lorraine and a researcher at BETA, this four-year project (2026–2030) brings together BETA, the Paris School of Economics (PSE) and the Brain Institute in Paris.