A mistake in reasoning, evaluating, remembering, or other cognitive process, often occuring as a result of holding onto one's preferences and beliefs regardless of contrary information.
What is a cognitive bias?
A cognitive bias is a systematic error in thinking that occurs when people are processing and interpreting information which also affects their judgments and decision-making. These biases are often your brain's attempt at simplifying the information that it is taking in from the environment. They are usually how an individual makes sense of the events or situations in his surroundings.
Cognitive biases are mostly related to two things; memory and attention. If you were to make a decision at this moment, considering all options would slow down the decision making process - therefore, your brain will resort to a shortcut which will either be linked to your memory (your past experiences) or what you mostly pay attention to (could be anything that grabs your attention e.g. race or ethnicity). Ofcourse there are other factors that could contribute to these biases and impact your judgement; e.g. Emotions or Individual motivations and even social pressures.
Because cognitive biases lead to distorted thinking, identifying and overcoming these biases is very important.
How to become aware of Cognitive Biases?
Cognitive biases are inherently part of all of us. Whether or not we realize it, it affects how we perceive other people and other things around us. These biases can be harmful to others and can have lasting repercussions. I am aware that I do have cognitive biases and am trying to become more open-minded and accepting of other points of view. One way I try to do this is through meditation, yoga, and prayer. These moments of quiet and self-care allow me to reflect on my own thoughts and understand my thinking process. I have found that after 10 minutes of meditation or yoga, I have become more attentive in what I say to other people and how I perceive their points of view. This allows me to become more aware of my cognitive biases and I try to listen to other people.
Causes:
If you had to think about every possible option when making a decision, it would take a lot of time to make even the simplest choice. Because of the sheer complexity of the world around you and the amount of information in the environment, it is necessary sometimes to rely on some mental shortcuts that allow you to act quickly.
Cognitive biases can be caused by a number of different things, but it is these mental shortcuts, known as heuristics, that often play a major contributing role. While they can often be surprisingly accurate, they can also lead to errors in thinking.
Other factors that can also contribute to these biases:
Emotions
Individual motivations
Limits on the mind's ability to process information
Social pressures
Cognitive bias may also increase as people get older due to decreased cognitive flexibility.
How to overcome a cognitive bias?
Cognitive Bias is a mistake in reasoning, evaluation, remembering, or other cognitive processes, often occurring as a result of holding onto one's preferences and beliefs regardless of contrary information. There are many different types of cognitive biases. One of them is confirmation bias.
Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, favour and recall information in a way that confirms one's pre-existing beliefs or hypotheses.
Steps to overcome confirmation bias
1. Recognise
2. Consider
3. Research
Different types of cognitive bias:
Anchoring bias
Definition: the tendency to rely too heavily on the first piece of information offered (the "anchor") when making decisions. During decision-making, anchoring occurs when individuals use an initial piece of information to make subsequent judgments. The pre-information they receive becomes the psychological benchmark through which they compare with new information they receive, therefore affecting their final decision.
Example:
When bargaining, people often use the first piece of information - the initial price given - as an anchor for negotiation. Purchasing an item, if the first item is expensive, and the second item is cheaper, you may decide to purchase the second item due to it being cheaper (compared to the first item).
Study: Strack and Mussweiler 1997
Aim: to investigate anchoring bias as a special case of semantic priming
Method:
Opportunity sampling of 69 german university students, recruited during lunchtime in the school canteen, participants answered questions on a computer screen, each question had 2 components:
In the first component, participants were asked to make a comparative judgment about something. The question acted as an anchor
Strack and Mussweiler used an implausible anchor to see if it would have an effect. An example was:
Did Mahatma Gandhi die before or after the age of 9? (low anchor, implausible
Did Mahatma Gandhi die before or after the age of 140? (high anchor, implausible)
in the second component, participants were then asked to provide an absolute estimate for the target information. e.g How old was Mahatma Gandhi when he died? (The actual answer is 78) Results were calculated as the mean value offered for the second task
Result:
Participants that received the low anchor answered a mean value of 50.1 years old. Whereas participants who received the higher anchor answered a mean value of 66.7 years old.
Anchor influenced the final value offered, those offered the higher anchor gave a higher value in the second component, and vise versa.
How to reduce this cognitive bias:
Take time to make decisions-- this will allow you to collect more information and thus dilute the effect of the anchor.
Attentional bias:
Definition : Attentional bias refers to how a person's perception is affected by selective factors in their attention.
Examples :
• Cigarette smokers have a tendency to notice smoking-related cues around them.
• A pregnant woman may see more strollers in the street.
How to reduce this cognitive bias :
Keep an open mind to what you are seeing and try to analyze whether or not it is related to your current life. If you have a dog and you tend to notice all the dogs around you, you know where that comes from.
Blind spot bias
Definition: A blind spot bias is a cognitive blind spot that keeps people from seeing their own biases. This bias can prevent people from seeing things that have a critical role in the decisions they make.
Examples:
You tend to leave for appointments with just enough time to spare. However, you're often late because things unexpectedly happen during the trip. There could be traffic or car trouble. You know that you should give yourself more time but you rationalise, saying, 'There will not be any traffic. There will not be…' even though past experience dictates that unexpected things will delay you.
When in an argument, you tend to think that the other person is biased in their judgement, and you tend to believe that you are the only one being correct, whereas in reality, both of you are biased.
How to avoid:
Be aware that the bias are acting upon you, and you can make deliberate steps to counteract their effect, such as talking with someone who has the opposite opinion as you.
Confirmation bias
Definition: Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms one's preexisting beliefs or hypotheses.
Examples:
MBTI personality tests, astrology, only following people who share the same values/beliefs as you
Study: Snyder and Swann (1978)
Aim: Aims to determine whether individuals use social interaction to actively test hypotheses about other people.
Method: Sample: 58 Female undergraduates at the University of Minnesota who received extra credit in their introductory psychology course. Convenience sampling: there was a substantially greater availability of female participants than male participants.
Procedure:
they told female college students that they would meet a person who was either introverted (reserved, cool) or extroverted (outgoing, warm)
The participants were then asked to prepare a set of questions for the person they were going to meet.
Results:
In general, participants came up with questions that confirmed their perceptions of introverts and extroverts. Those who thought they were going to meet an introvert asked, “What do you dislike about parties?” or “Are there times you wish you could be more outgoing?” and extroverts were asked, “What do you do to liven up a party?”
The researchers concluded that the questions asked confirmed participants’ stereotypes of each personality type so that it became a self-fulfilling prophecy
How to reduce this cognitive bias:
Beware of repetition: just because some opinions are repeated over and over does not mean that they are true.
Search for disconfirming evidence of your theory.
Why confirmation bias happen?
People tend to find information that is in accordance with what they want to believe. This leads to the lack of real facts and the maximization of their ideal information. Thus, people are selectively accepting and seeking out information.
One experiment conducted in 2004 found when people are believing what they want to believe, the part for reasoning (dorsolateral prefrontal cortex) is inactive in the brain. Instead, the part for processing emotions is active (orbitofrontal cortex). Furthermore, your brain awards you with a rush of dopamine when you are doing this. From the social perspective, confirmation bias is reckoned as a way to protect ourselves from being "alone". Human is hypersocial so we are reluctant to get in touch with information or new ideas that can threaten the connection between an individual and the group's mainstream.
Fundamental Attribution Error
Definition: The fundamental attribution error refers to an individual's tendency to attribute another's actions to their character or personality, while attributing their behavior to external situational factors outside of their control.
Fundamental attribution error is also known as correspondence bias where people assume a person’s actions depend on the personality instead of social or environmental influences
Tendency to rely on personality-based explanations for behaviors when judging others, and underestimating situational and environmental explanations.
Examples:
If someone is behaving angrily, one may assume they are just an angry person, but in reality, they may have had a bad day.
Assuming that someone who gets a low grade on a subject is lazy.
When watching TV ,people attribute the behaviour of actors on the show to their personality,rather than to the script.
Overcoming Fundamental Attribution Error:
Practising gratitude: When becoming resentful at someone for their bad qualities, make a list of 5 positive qualities that the person also displays
Practising empathy: Learn to consider the full context of the situation the person is in before being quick to judge
Think of the good qualities of a person.
Focus on the behaviour instead of the person: avoid raising complaints to the level of someone's character.
Framing bias
Definition: The tendency to make a decision based on the way information is presented.
Examples:
Behavioural Economics
how things are marketed, such as only 10% fat vs 90% fat free
Study: Tversky and Kahneman (1986)
Aim: Test the influence of positive and negative frames on decision making
Method:
Participants were asked to make a decision between one of two options in a hypothetical scenario where they were choosing how to respond to the outbreak of a virulent disease
For some participants, the information was framed positively while other participants framed it negatively
Condition 1: Positive frame
The participants were given the ‘positive frame’. Their choices consisted of;
Program A adopted: 200 people will be saved
Program B adopted: ⅓ probability that 600 people will be saved and ⅔ probability that no one will be saved
Condition 2: Negative frame
The participants were given the ’negative frame.’ Their choices consisted of :
Program C adopted: 400 people will die
Program D adopted: there is ⅓ probability that nobody will die, and ⅔ probability that 600 people will die
Results:
The results clearly demonstrate the influence of the frame where the information was phrased positively, people took the certain outcome and avoided the possibility of a loss in the less certain outcome
Outcome bias
Definition: Outcome bias is the tendency to judge a decision based on its results rather than on what factors led to / qualities of the decision at the time it was made.
Examples:
If a doctor chose to execute a risky surgery that had a 30% chance of patient survival and failed, he would be blamed and punished for making a rash decision. However, the low chance of patient survival was not considered in this judgement.
Consequences:
Outcome bias prevents us from learning proper lessons from previous experiences and blinds us to the real risks of a decision. It can be especially harmful when a poorly-made decision leads to a positive result, as outcome bias means that any decision process that led to a good result is automatically good.
How can we overcome it?
The entire decision-making process should be evaluated rather than just the final decision itself. Asking questions such as, "What led us to make the decision?" "Was there information we were missing at that point?" "Was there any need for the decision at the moment?" etc that question the process and the outcome can lead to better, well-informed decision-making in the future.
Projection bias
Definition: the tendency to believe that other people share the same beliefs as yourself, projecting thoughts into a place where they are no longer accurate.
Example: Bringing a friend to your personal favourite restaurant, regardless of their preferences, because you assume that they will share your belief in the quality of the restaurant. This can also apply to other suggestions such as media like books, movies, and TV shows. Your bias towards your favoured media can affect the decision-making process due to projection of beliefs.
Study: An Experiment on Interpersonal Projection Bias by Benjamin Bushong and Tristan Gagnon-Bartsch
Aim: To show that people project their current tastes onto others, even when others’ tastes are exogenously manipulated and transparently different.
Method:
In the first stage, “workers” stated their willingness to continue working on a tedious task.
The number of tasks completed by workers was varied before eliciting their willingness to work (WTW); some were relatively fresh when stating their WTW, while others were relatively tired.
Later, a separate group of “predictors”—who also worked on the task—guessed the WTW of workers in each state.
Result:
Tired workers were found to be less willing to work than fresh workers.
Predictors accurately guessed the willingness to work of workers when they were in the same state as the workers about whom they were predicting. However:
When fresh predictors were guessing about tired workers, they substantially overestimated their willingness to work;
When tired predictors were guessing about fresh workers, they underestimated their willingness to work.
Projection of the current state of predictors affected the prediction of the willingness to work of the workers they were predicting.
How do we avoid projection bias?
Projection bias can be avoided by asking the other party their preferences/feelings on the subject matter, thereby avoiding projection of own preferences by asking for and acknowledging theirs.
Representative bias
Definition:
It is a cognitive bias where the similarity of objects or events confuses people's thinking and regarding the probability of an outcome.
Examples:
Investors assuming that good companies make good investments.
When a person might support a political candidate because they fit the image of someone they think is a great leader without learning much about the candidate's background.
How to reduce this cognitive bias:
Approach every situation with a fresh perspective.
Focus on solving problems through logic.
Hindsight bias
Definition: Involves the tendency to see events, even random ones, as more predictable as they are. "I knew it all along" or "I knew that was going to happen"
Example: When a person claims they knew a certain team was going to win
How to reduce effects: Compare outcomes to the reasoning behind certain actions
Causes: Memory errors, fixating on the eventual outcome
Bandwagon Effect
Definition: The tendency of people to adopt certain behaviours, styles or attitudes simply because others are doing so.
Examples:
Following certain fashion
Diet trends because everyone is doing so, for example when avocado toast became a huge thing.
How to avoid:
Use your own judgement in situations to assess whether or not that lifestyle/ behaviour is something that you're comfortable with.
Approach new situations rationally without jumping to conclusions.
Zero risk bias
Definition: A bias in which an option that guarantees some degree of success would be preferred over an option that involves some risk, but with which the potential gain is greater.
Examples:
Hiring a job applicant who proposes to do things in a traditional way over an applicant whose new ideas involve risk, but promise greater rewards for the company
Staying at a job that isn't satisfying but provides secure income over following one's dream to become a famous musician
Ways to overcome the bias
Create a rule about the amount of risk you are willing to take in any given situation, to make sure you aren't always going with the safer option
Get other people's opinion about whether or not you should take a risk, so you aren't only relying on your own instincts
Why does the bias exist?
The zero risk bias can be explained using a behaviourist concept: loss aversion. Kahneman and Tversky proposed that the prospect of a loss is more frightening to us than the prospect of gain is encouraging. This means that we choose options with the least loss involved so as to eliminate that fear.
How is the bias exploited by businesses?
A way in which businesses exploit our tendency to choose the options involving the least risk is by implementing a 'Money back guarantee'. This means that the risk of buying a product that we have no use for and thereby wasting money is eliminated.
Misinformation effect
Definition: The misinformation effect is the tendency for memories to be heavily influenced by things that happened after the actual event itself. A person who witnesses a car accident might believe that their recollection is crystal clear, but researchers have found that memory is surprisingly susceptible to even very subtle influences.
Examples:
Research has shown that simply asking questions about an event can change someone's memories of what happened.
Watching television coverage may change how people remember the event.
Hearing other people talk about a memory from their perspective may change your memory of what transpired.
Research:
Elizabeth Loftus conducted a research where she interrogated people who watched a video of a car crash. They were then asked one of two slightly different questions: “How fast were the cars going when they hit each other?” or “How fast were the cars going when they smashed into each other?” A week later, when witnesses were asked if they saw broken glass, those who were asked about the "smashed" version were more likely to falsely report that they saw broken glass.
How to reduce this cognitive bias :
Writing down memories right after the event happened
Being aware that you are susceptible to influence on your memory and understand that anyone can be affected by the misinformation effect.
Optimism bias
Definition: Involves the tendency to overestimate the likelihood that good things will happen to us while understanding the probability that negative effects will impact our lives. It is the illusion of invulnerability.
Example: A person assumes that they won't be affected if they lose a job
How to reduce effects: "Pre-mortem approach": This is where one predicts possible areas of failure before an action or project.
Causes: By believing we are unlikely to fail, we are more likely to succeed; therefore, people aim to be optimistic about life in general.
The availability heuristic
Definition: Involves the tendency to estimate the probability of something based on how many examples readily come to mind.
Example: A person assumes that they may lose their job after seeing several articles on other people losing their jobs.
How to reduce effects: Critically analyse the situation and look at the bigger picture. Take a logical and rational approach to information.
Actor-observer bias
Definition: Involves the tendency to attribute our actions to external influences and other people's actions to internal ones.
Example: A person assumes that when they are late to a meeting after a flight, it is because they are jetlagged. However, they assume that if someone else is late to a meeting after. a flight, it is because they are lazy.
How to reduce effects: Be empathetic about things and consider the reasons as to why something has gone the way it has. Likewise, be realistic with yourself and take responsibility for areas you can.
Loss aversion bias
Definition: when losses impact you more than gains of similar value do
Example: when having to choose between a 30% chance of loosing 500 dollars and a 70% chance of gaining 600 dollars, you choose to avoid loosing money.
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