Contradictions pervade the human experience, none more so than the yawning chasm that often exists between our awareness and our actions. We are knowledgeable creatures, indeed, our very survival depends on it. Yet, for all we know, we frequently do not act in ways that reflect our understanding.

We grasp, sometimes even with a deceptive profundity, the benefits of a healthy lifestyle, the importance of mindful, aware communication, the ethical implications of our choices. And yet society, as a whole, seems to lurch from one avoidable disaster to another, with collectively more certain appearance of wisdom than actual appearance of it in our daily lives.

Think about what seems to be the obvious. From a very young age, we are deeply impressed with the notion that playing with fire can have serious and harmful consequences. Most of us are attracted to fire in some form, be it a campfire, bonfire, fireplace, or space heater. Even in the work that I do safety is always at the forefront of my thinking, and rightfully so.

There is a clear and present danger. Yet, every year, people by the thousands lose their homes and even their lives due to fires that are remarkably similar to those that some of us, at least, seem to be often on the verge of setting.

This intrinsic disconnection has a considerable effect on how we understand and interpret our own actions and those of other people. Even though the fabric of lived experience offers a rich and finely detailed understanding of human interactions - and is a supremely good source for gathering the qualitative data that are so crucial for maintaining empathy and good human relations - it is a sincerely poor foundation upon which to build a science of human behaviour.

The only thing that makes it even partially acceptable is the fact that it is such an obviously good source for generating hypotheses. And it is from those former lived experiences (after some hefty amounts of autobiographical memory distortion) that we only rarely see the good underside of human behaviour. The handful of lived experiences that make it good enough to serve as a source for generating hypotheses truly and clearly have a bright side.

In today's digital society, the temptation of information that's easily available can give a false sense of understanding. The huge number of online courses, self-help fanatics on social media, and easy-to-understand content on places like YouTube might lead one to believe that a thorough understanding of human behaviour is something everyone can have. But linking this kind of exposure to the amount and kind of understanding one would gain from a formal education in psychology, sociology, or anthropology is a huge oversimplification.

Picture trying to understand the complicated dynamics of a complex machine by just looking at online forums and watching home-repair-type videos. You might gather some basic knowledge but would inevitably be without the kind of deep, foundational know-how that comes from studying the related engineering principles and (if we're using this analogy correctly) a sort of material science and diagnostic procedure curriculum. You can probably see where I'm going with this.

Without these solid theoretical frameworks, our interpretations of human behaviour run the risk of being fragmented, moulded by our personal biases, and ultimately, shallow. Contrary to our everyday limited understanding, formal academic study provides a systematic way of unravelling the knotty problems of human action.

It exposes us to a diversity of theoretical perspectives, mazes that themselves can be negotiated only with the presence of an intellectual guide. It forces us to confront the assumptions we naturally make and to judge the worth of these cosy conclusions. All these practices can be said to democratise and enrich our everyday interpretive acts.

Thus, for anyone who dreams of moving beyond superficial observations and truly engaging with the intricate science of why we think, feel, and act the way we do, the foundational knowledge acquired through formal education is not just beneficial - it is an absolute must.

Without this rigorous academic grounding, our ability to understand and discuss the behaviour of humans with any real insight and authority is constrained (at best) by our personal experience or (at worst) muddled by the oversimplifications, half-truths, or downright lies that the equally muddled science of human behaviour has so often served up.