In studies examining the my-side bias, people were able to generate and remember more reasons supporting their side of a controversial issue than the opposing side. People give special treatment to information that supports their personal beliefs. Information that conflicts with the decision may cause discomfort and is therefore ignored or given little consideration. In the context of decision making, once an individual makes a decision, he or she will look for information that supports it. EvidenceĬonfirmation bias is strong and widespread, occurring in several contexts. People want to feel that they are intelligent, and information that suggests one holds an inaccurate belief or made a poor decision suggests one is lacking intelligence.
Therefore, people will seek information that supports their existing beliefs.
People like to feel good about themselves, and discovering that a belief that they highly value is incorrect makes people feel bad about themselves. It is adaptive to rely on instinctive, automatic reflexes that keep humans out of harm’s way.Īnother reason people show confirmation bias is to protect their self-esteem. People need to process information quickly to protect themselves from harm. Human decision making and information processing is often biased because people are limited to interpreting information from their own viewpoint. Humans are bombarded with information in the social world and cannot possibly take the time to carefully process each piece of information to form an unbiased conclusion. One explanation for why humans are susceptible to confirmation bias is that it is an efficient way to process information. Humans are better able to rationally process information, giving equal weight to multiple viewpoints, if they are emotionally distant from the issue (although a low level of confirmation bias can still occur when an individual has no vested interests). Philosophers note that humans have difficulty processing information in a rational, unbiased manner once they have developed an opinion about the issue. Many factors of which people are unaware can influence information processing. Background and historyĬonfirmation bias is one example of how humans sometimes process information in an illogical, biased manner. People are especially likely to process information to support their own beliefs when the issue is highly important or self-relevant. Existing beliefs can include one’s expectations in a given situation and predictions about a particular outcome. This biased approach to decision making is largely unintentional and often results in ignoring inconsistent information. SpaceNext50 Britannica presents SpaceNext50, From the race to the Moon to space stewardship, we explore a wide range of subjects that feed our curiosity about space!Ĭonfirmation bias, the tendency to process information by looking for, or interpreting, information that is consistent with one’s existing beliefs.Learn about the major environmental problems facing our planet and what can be done about them! Saving Earth Britannica Presents Earth’s To-Do List for the 21st Century.Britannica Beyond We’ve created a new place where questions are at the center of learning.100 Women Britannica celebrates the centennial of the Nineteenth Amendment, highlighting suffragists and history-making politicians.
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