Sometimes, cognitive biases are so obvious, it seems that they require no explanation. Primacy effect is the tendency for people to prioritize the first items in a list. This tendency is not so bad when we're talking about a list that's numerically ordered—your favorite 50 songs, for instance—but it poses an issue when the list … Continue reading On the primacy effect
Tag: cognitive bias
On the next-in-line effect
I can't remember when I first learned about this phenomenon, but I do remember having the dumb thought: I don't fall for this. But whenever the opportunity for it next came up—going around the table introducing ourselves—I discovered that the name of the person who'd gone just before me was—well, exactly. I had no idea. … Continue reading On the next-in-line effect
On the planning fallacy
Oh, dear. If there’s a cognitive bias that defines my life, it’s this one. Ever an optimist, I am often—always—greatly underestimating how much time and effort it will take to do—well, go do just about anything. Write an email, review an RFP, eat lunch, pick a toddler up from daycare. It could be anything—the planning … Continue reading On the planning fallacy
On effort justification
The more effort you put into something, the more value you see in it. The best-known example of this may be the "IKEA effect," wherein people place higher value on the IKEA products they have bought and assembled—because of the assembly effort involved. Effort justification is one route to resolve lingering cognitive dissonance, a state … Continue reading On effort justification
On the doorway effect
I didn't need to learn the name of this effect to know that it exists. Wait. Why did I come up here? It's only with a single-minded focus, or by carrying some physical object, that I can remember why I have walked into a room. At least once a day, I find myself striding into … Continue reading On the doorway effect
On the well-traveled road effect
I drive the same 2.6-mile stretch of Ward Road at least twice a day. I could give an intersection-by-intersection overview if prodded, from the house on the hill that has yard decorations and blowups for every holiday imaginable to the pig statue that graces the used car lot off of 48th Street. What I couldn't … Continue reading On the well-traveled road effect
On survivorship bias
One of the revelations of my early 30s came in reading Cal Newport’s So Good They Can't Ignore You: Why Skills Trump Passion In The Quest For Work You Love, a book that dispelled the age-old career advice “do what you love” The “do what you love” advice is in generous at heart, because it … Continue reading On survivorship bias
On frequency illusion
I was in college when I first heard the name: Baader-Meinhof. And then—in totally appropriate fashion—I started seeing the name everywhere. The Baader-Meinhof phenomenon, also known as frequency illusion, is when you encounter something for the first time and then proceed to notice it everywhere (where, of course, it already was to begin with). “Baader-Meinhof”—to … Continue reading On frequency illusion
On attentional bias
We can't pay attention to everything. Every waking moment of the day, the world hurls information at us. Given the firehose of data pumped in through our senses, our minds have to be selective about what deserves our attention. With bias built into our systems from the get-go, it's no surprise that there are additional … Continue reading On attentional bias
On functional fixedness
This didn't strike me as a bias at first. Though perhaps I'm so deeply affected by it that I resist the category. Closely related to the law of the instrument, functional fixedness is the cognitive bias describing the inability to consider the use of an object outside its typical function. Overcoming any cognitive bias is … Continue reading On functional fixedness
Taylor Coe 