The Glossary of Cognitive Biases — Part 1: (A-C)
How to avoid thinking what you really don’t know
Much of what we do in life is strategizing to make the best decisions. Strategizing can be a very complex process. The more critical a thinker we are, the more we need to beware of our cognitive biases, systematic errors in thinking that occur when we are processing and interpreting information in the world around us, and doing so affects the decisions and judgments that we make.
Thus the more experienced, and more skillful we seem to be at any given task, the possibility also arises that we may be less able to articulate and recognize the components of that specific task and what needs to be done to address it effectively. Our brains may require less attention to certain parts of the task due to our skill at it.
The same goes for critical thinking. With basic skills, and understanding we may have enough experience that we no longer require in-depth thought to make the best choices. Still in our high-tech world of social networking, cybercrime, big data, and smart devices what we knew to be common sense in the past, may no longer be as common as it once was. Out biases here ca really make thing complicated.
Here is an introduction to the concept of Cognitive Bias
A Comprehensive list of Cognitive Biases
Here are the Cognitive Biases I have gathered and organized over the last decade.
In my work as a strategist, futurist, and in my development of HAGT (Harrison’s Applied Game Thinking) it became clear that the more rational, and less biased I could be as individual the more PEEPPASA I would become. Thus, as I began to gather, process, and organize fact and evidence I always needed to filter it to reduce my chance of bias.
Here is the first part of the over 180 biases I have isolated.
A:
· Abilene paradox: A situation where a group of people collectively decide on a course of action that is counter to the preferences of many (or all) of the individuals in the group. It involves a common breakdown of group communication in which each member mistakenly believes that their own preferences are counter to the group’s and, therefore, does not raise objections. A common phrase relating to the Abilene Paradox is a desire not to “rock the boat.” This differs from groupthink in that the Abilene paradox is characterized by an inability to manage agreement.
· Actor–observer bias: The tendency for explanations of other individuals’ behaviors to overemphasize the influence of their personality and underemphasize the influence of their situation (see also Fundamental attribution error), and for explanations of one’s own behaviors to do the opposite (that is, to overemphasize the influence of our situation and underemphasize the influence of our own personality).
· Adaptive bias: The idea that the human brain has evolved to reason adaptively, rather than truthfully or even rationally, and that cognitive bias may have evolved as a mechanism to reduce the overall cost of cognitive errors as opposed to merely reducing the number of cognitive errors, when faced with making a decision under conditions of uncertainty.
· Affect heuristic: An information-processing shortcut where a person bases a decision on an emotional reaction rather than a calculation of risks and benefits
· Affinity bias: A Tendency to a favorable perspective toward people most like ourselves.
· Ambiguity effect: The tendency to avoid options for which missing information makes the probability seem “unknown”.
· Anchoring bias (focalism): The tendency to rely too heavily, or “anchor”, on one trait or piece of information when making decisions (usually the first piece of information that we acquire on that subject).
An example of anchoring would be seeing a house that costs $1,000,000 — and then seeing a second one for $500,000 and feeling as though the second house seemed inexpensive. If instead, we’d first seen a house that cost $200,000, we’d feel differently about that $500,000 house.
· Anchoring effect: The tendency for a person to rely heavily on the first piece of information they receive when making decisions.
· Attentional bias: The tendency of our perception to be affected by our recurring thoughts.
· Attribution error: The tendency for people to over-emphasize personality-based explanations for behaviors observed in others while under-emphasizing the role and power of situational influences on the same behavior. An example might be (see also actor-observer bias, group attribution error, positivity effect, fundamental attribution error, and negativity effect).
· Attribution asymmetry: Here people tend to attribute their own success to internal factors, including abilities and talents, but explain their failures in terms of external factors such as bad luck. The reverse bias is shown when people explain others’ success or failure.
· Attribute substitution: Making a complex, difficult judgment by unconsciously replacing it with an easier judgment.
· Automation bias: The tendency to excessively depend on automated systems that can lead to erroneous automated information overriding correct decisions.
· Availability heuristic: The tendency to overestimate the likelihood of events with greater “availability” in memory, which can be influenced by how recent the memories are or how unusual or emotionally charged they may be.
· Availability cascade: A self-reinforcing process in which a collective belief gains more and more plausibility through its increasing repetition in public discourse (or “repeat something long enough and it will become true”).
B:
· Backfire effect: When people react to disconfirming evidence by strengthening their beliefs.
· Bandwagon effect: The tendency to do (or believe) things because many other people do (or believe) the same. Related to groupthink and herd behavior.
· Base rate fallacy or Base rate neglect: The tendency to ignore base rate information (generic, general information) and focus on specific information (information only pertaining to a certain case).
· Belief bias: An effect where someone’s evaluation of the logical strength of an argument is biased by the believability of the conclusion.
· Belief revision (Bayesian conservatism): A positive bias and process of changing beliefs to take into account a new piece of information. The logical formalization of belief revision is researched in philosophy, in databases, and in artificial intelligence for the design of rational agents.
· Bias blind spot: The tendency to see oneself as less biased than other people, or to be able to identify more cognitive biases in others than in oneself.
· Bizarreness effect (MB): Bizarre material is better remembered than common material.
C:
· Change bias (MB): After an investment of effort in producing change, remembering one’s past performance as more difficult than it actually was.
· Choice-supportive bias: In a self-justifying manner retroactively ascribing one’s choices to be more informed than they were when they were made. Another way of describing it is when people distort their memories of chosen and rejected options to make the chosen options seem more attractive.
· Cheerleader effect: The tendency for people to appear more attractive in a group than in isolation.
· Childhood amnesia (MB): The retention of few memories from before the age of four.
· Choice-supportive bias: The tendency for people to appear more attractive in a group than in isolation.
Here is a Medium story on this subject @buster
An Interview With My Masters: What Is Truth?
Author: Lewis Harrison is a Manifestation Coach, professional futurist (forecaster), and professional copywriter. He is the creator of the Ask Lewis Mentoring Method as well as HAGT — Harrison’s Applied Game Theory. He is the Executive Director of the International Association of Healing Professionals an educational organization that offers programs around the world in Intentional Living. He is also an Independent Scholar, with a passion for knowledge, personal development, self-improvement, creativity, innovation, and problem-solving. You can read all of his Medium stories at [email protected].
For a decade, Lewis was the host of a humor-based Q & A talk show on NPR (National Public Radio) affiliated WIOX FM in NY.
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