Six Cognitive Biases that are Probably Preventing You from Thinking Rationally (Part 1)

We'd all like to think that we see the world in an objective, rational manner. Unfortunately, our minds are hardwired to see the world in an egocentric frame of reference, and thus information tends to get distorted, lost, or invented. Over the course of evolution, the human brain has evolved many mechanisms for extracting the most relevant information it can out of the surrounding environment without having to overload its senses. One broad category of such mechanisms is the cognitive bias. Cognitive biases have evolved to speed up judgment times and make decisions easier to come by. However, by decreasing judgment time, your brain often sacrifices objectivity and precision. Decision-making mechanisms that speed up reaction time (while sacrificing accuracy) are referred to as heuristic, and there have been many identified in cognitive psychology. Cognition can also be persuaded by goals or motivational states (we often perceive things as we'd like to see them). Below, I will list six cognitive biases that are probably affecting the way you see the world.

1) The Fundamental Attribution Error

This one has to do with attributions, the ways in which you describe and interpret the behaviour of others. The fundamental attribution error occurs when you underestimate situational influences on another person's behaviour and overestimate the effects of that person's personality. For example, if you see a woman yelling at her child in a supermarket, you are likely to infer that she is an angry person, maybe even a bad mother. Why should that be your first impression when it is equally likely she's just having a bad day?

There are a few explanations for how this bias arose, but the explanation I like best has to do with another cognitive bias: the just-world hypothesis. This bias presumes that the world is a just place (we'd all like to believe that, right?) and so, basically, people get what they deserve. This is the bias that surrounds ideas like karma. Attributing other people's failures to their dispositional downfalls rather than situational causes allows us to keep believing that other people reap what they sow.


2) Confirmation Bias

Humans have an overwhelming tendency to confirm their own beliefs. Hence, it shouldn't come as a surprise that we're hardwired to do just that. The confirmation bias is the tendency to collect information from our surroundings that supports ideas or beliefs that we have already formulated. If you think you're allergic to your roommate's new perfume, than you'll notice the few times you sneeze while your roommate is wearing her perfume - while you miss out on the hundreds of times you sneeze while petting your cat. It's hard to think objectively when your brain is constantly searching for information that validates your beliefs.

The confirmation bias can even work its way into the realm of science. A well known problem in academia is the so-called publication bias (otherwise known as the "file drawer effect") which is the tendency to publish positive results and ignore negative or inconclusive results.


3) The Misinformation Effect

You may be aware that witness testimonies are not terribly accurate. Furthermore, you may know that leading questions (questions that direct the witness to a particular answer) are restricted in eliciting a testimony in court. Why is this? Well, it has to do with the misinformation effect: the tendency for information presented after an event to alter recall of that memory. The memory can be altered by presenting an individual with convincing post-event information that can shape the way the memory is recalled.

Memory traces are normally stabilized through a process called consolidation. Consolidation is dependent on protein synthesis at the molecular level and the hippocampus at the structural level. When a memory is retrieved, it enters a brief labile state where it must be reconsolidated. During this process, it is possible that new information can disrupt the reconsolidation of the memory and thus alter it. While still theoretical at this point, reconsolidation provides a promising framework for how our memories can be so inaccurate and misleading at times.