Biases Flashcards
Anchoring
The first thing you judge influences your judgement of all that follows
Confirmation Bias
You look for ways to justify your existing beliefs
Sunk Cost Fallacy
You irrationally cling to things that have already cost you something
Dunning-Kruger Effect
People with little ability often overestimate themselves because they don’t have the skills to recognize their own incompetence
“The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are so certain of themselves, yet wiser people are so full of doubts” - Bertrand Russell
Backfire Effect
When your core beliefs are challenged, it can cause you to believe even more strongly.
Hindsight Bias
You see events, even random ones, as more predictable than they are.
It’s also commonly referred to as the “I knew it all along” phenomenon.
Pre-confirmation 58% of students thought Clarence Thomas would be confirmed to Supreme Court, afterward 78% said they believed he would make it.
The Misinformation Effect
The tendency for memories to be heavily influenced by things that happened after the actual event itself.
Loftus experiment, asked witnesses how fast the cars were going when they (a) hit (b) smashed into each other. Week later (b) group were more likely to misremember there was broken glass
FAE / Actor-Observer Bias
The tendency to attribute our actions to circumstance and other people’s actions to character
I messed up the presentation because I was exhausted, my partner messed it up because he’s incompetent.
The False Consensus Effect
The tendency to overestimate how much other people agree with their own beliefs, behaviors, attitudes, and values.
The Halo Effect
How much you like someone, or how attractive they are, influences your other judgements of them
Self-serving Bias
The tendency for people tend to give themselves credit for successes but lay the blame for failures on outside causes
The Availability Heuristic
The tendency to estimate the probability of something happening based on how many examples readily come to mind.
If you can think of 3 stories of shark attacks but 0 or squirrel attacks, you’re likely to skew shark attacks as more likely than they are
The Optimism Bias
The tendency to overestimate the likelihood that good things will happen to us while underestimating the probability that negative events will impact our lives.
Overjustification Effect
An external incentive decreases a person’s intrinsic motivation to perform a behaviour or participate in an activity.
Why? Perhaps people view external reinforcement as coercive. Or they focus on rewards more than their own enjoyment of the activity.
Has smaller effect if reward is dependent on performance. (e.g. get ice cream if you get A+)
