Why I’m right…
& you’re wrong!
Jennie Gunlogson, DC, CACCP
Cornerstone Chiropractic, Montevideo
Class description
Do you ever find it difficult to have a conversation with someone about a topic that you don’t see eye to eye? They clearly are not seeing things from the correct point of view, right?! We know that humans naturally have the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms or supports your prior beliefs or values. It has a name & it’s called confirmation bias. However, this often shields us from seeing the other side of the story, EVEN when we are wrong.
We are going to discuss what confirmation bias is, how you may see it showing up in your life, how it may potentially affect how you teach, or affect your relationships with others.
We will also discuss how confirmation bias may affect your students’ ability to learn & work with others.
It is also very important that we discuss how search engines and social media are engineered to feed us information that confirms our confirmation bias, only making it worse.
We will also talk about how to work against this natural tendency to form better relationships & conversations with those around us. In the end, how we interact with and treat other people who maybe don't have the same confirmation bias as us is paramount to having healthy conversations, discussions & maybe even disagreements.
What is bias?
Bias is an inclination, prejudice, preference or tendency towards or against a person, group, thing, idea or belief. Biases are usually unfair or prejudicial and are often based on stereotypes, rather than knowledge or experience. Bias is usually learned, although some biases may be innate. Bias can develop at any time in an individual’s life.
Bias is a uniquely human attribute. In some cases, the bias may be subconscious, and the individual may not be aware that they are experiencing bias towards others. Although biases can sometimes be positive or helpful to the individual, in the majority of cases, biases will be negative or damaging.
What is cognitive bias?
This is the most common type of bias. Research suggests that there are more than 175 different types of cognitive bias. Cognitive biases are repeated, systematic errors of thinking that occur when you misinterpret information in the world around you. It refers to deviation from standards of judgement whereby you may create inferences, assessments or perceptions that are unreasonable. You may also recollect past experiences incorrectly.
These perceptions may dictate your behaviour or attitude, either in a positive or negative way. Cognitive biases can affect the rationality of your judgement and can lead you to make inaccurate or unreasonable conclusions or decisions.
Cognitive biases are unconscious and usually automatic. They often occur when people are making quick decisions. However, cognitive biases often cause these decisions to be less accurate.
Some of the most common types of cognitive bias
Confirmation bias definition
Confirmation bias definition
Confirmation bias tendencies
We’ve all experienced…
People on two sides of an issue can listen to the same story and walk away with different interpretations that they feel validates their existing point of view. This is often indicative that the confirmation bias is working to "bias" their opinions.
Examples include:
Confirmation bias in action
Consider the debate over gun control. Let's say Sally is in support of gun control. She seeks out news stories and opinion pieces that reaffirm the need for limitations on gun ownership. When she hears stories about shootings in the media, she interprets them in a way that supports her existing beliefs.
Henry, on the other hand, is adamantly opposed to gun control. He seeks out news sources that are aligned with his position. When he comes across news stories about shootings, he interprets them in a way that supports his current point of view.
These two people have very different opinions on the same subject and their interpretations are based on their beliefs. Even if they read the same story, their bias tends to shape the way they perceive the details, further confirming their beliefs.
Confirmation bias in politics
During an election season, for example, people tend to seek positive information that paints their favored candidates in a good light. They will also look for information that casts the opposing candidate in a negative light.
By not seeking out objective facts, interpreting information in a way that only supports their existing beliefs, and only remembering details that uphold these beliefs, they often miss important information. These details and facts might have otherwise influenced their decision on which candidate to support.
Confirmation bias in medicine, law & education
Consider a doctor who subconsciously through confirmation bias and/or anchoring bias, lock in on a first impression diagnostically.
Consider a judge or jury who already has an opinion about the topic or person on trial or the person makes a poor first impression.
Consider a teacher or support staff who already has an opinion about a particular student.
Related: backfire effect
Backfire effect occurs when people’s preexisting beliefs strengthen when challenged by contradictory evidence. Therefore, disproving a misconception can actually strengthen a person's belief in that misconception.
One piece of disconfirming evidence does not result in a change in people’s views, but a constant flow of credible refutations could correct misinformation/misconceptions.
This effect is considered a subtype of confirmation bias because it explains people’s reactions to new information based on their preexisting hypotheses.
Related: naive realism
We are often unaware of the process of reaffirming our own prejudices. To the point where we believe it is obvious that we are right & our perceptions are right. Since it is obvious, someone who doesn’t see the world in the same way must be misinformed, evil, or stupid. We attempt to share one fact of information & if they don’t immediately change their mind, then clearly they weren’t just misinformed, they are evil or stupid.
I’m right… and you’re an idiot!”
Biased search for information
This type of confirmation bias explains people’s search for evidence in a one-sided way to support their hypotheses or theories.
When researching a topic, do you only search for support for your topic?
For example:
Let’s say that you wanted to learn more about the health effects of supplementing with Vitamin D. If you already believed it was good for you, you may only search out information that supports this. Rather, try searching more neutral terms or questions & see what you come up with! If you already have a preconceived notion of the answer, you may easily disregard information that opposes your view. Try to allow yourself to collect all of the information and THEN determine where the bulk of the evidence lies.
Biased interpretation
This type of bias explains that people interpret evidence with respect to their existing beliefs by typically evaluating confirming evidence differently than evidence that challenges their preconceptions.
Various experiments have shown that people tend to not change their beliefs on complex issues even after being provided with research because of the way they interpret the evidence.
Additionally, people accept “confirming” evidence more easily and critically evaluate the “disconfirming” evidence (this is known as disconfirmation bias). When provided with the same evidence, people’s interpretations could still be biased.
For example:
Biased interpretation is shown in an experiment conducted by Stanford University on the topic of capital punishment. It included participants who were in support of and others who were against capital punishment. All subjects were provided with the same two studies, and after reading the detailed descriptions of the studies, participants still held their initial beliefs and supported their reasoning by providing “confirming” evidence from the studies and rejecting any contradictory evidence, or considering it inferior to the “confirming” evidence.
Why do we do this?
1. Information processing: Confirmation bias serves as an efficient way to process information because of the limitless information humans are exposed to. Only seeking to confirm existing opinions helps limit mental resources we need to use to make decisions.
We live in an age of information overload; there is just too much to interpret. Because of this, we are inclined to select pieces of information we agree with wile exclude other challenging ideas. This has actually been studied and published- “when subjects were exposed to strong information overload, their belief updating behavior exhibits a stronger confirmation bias.”
Why do we do this?
2. Protect Self Esteem: People are susceptible to confirmation bias to protect their self-esteem (to know that their beliefs are accurate). To make themselves feel confident, they tend to look for information that supports their existing beliefs.
Why do we do this?
3. Minimize Cognitive Dissonance: Cognitive dissonance is a mental conflict that occurs when a person holds two contradictory beliefs and causes psychological stress/unease in a person. To minimize this dissonance, people adapt to confirmation bias by avoiding information that is contradictory to their views and seeking evidence confirming their beliefs.
Search engines
Google: If you were to search “Are cats better than dogs?” in Google, all you will get are sites listing the reasons why cats are better. However, if you were to search “Are dogs better than cats?” Google will only provide you with sites that believe dogs are better than cats.
Phrasing questions in a one-sided way (i.e. affirmative manner) will assist you in obtaining evidence consistent with your hypothesis.
Social media
Tendency to follow people and pages we agree with.
Tendency to interact with people and pages we agree with.
Social media algorithms want us to see more of what we like, so they show us more of what we interact with and less of what we don’t interact with (or negatively interact with). It’s easy for our brains to interpret that much of the world is then like us in our opinions, but in reality we’re just not seeing the people & pages with which we disagree.
News media
Today, people are exposed to an overwhelming number of news sources, each varying in their credibility.
To form conclusions, people tend to read the news that aligns with their perspectives. For instance, news channels provide information (even the same news) differently from each other on complex issues (i.e. racism, political parties, etc.), with some using sensational headlines/pictures and one-sided information.
Additionally, people tend to only utilize certain channels/sites to obtain their information & therefore make biased conclusions.
discussion
What are some ways in which you can see confirmation bias showing up in your daily life (home and work)?
(Yes, you can notice it in others… BUT try really hard to notice it in yourself!)
Confirmation bias in a learning environment
Confirmation bias can present itself in several ways:
Confirmation bias in a learning environment
Confirmation bias in a learning environment
Surveys should always have neutral questioning.
Appoint someone to play devil’s advocate.
Confirmation bias in students
Researching topics for class projects: Have they been taught how to research properly?
Parental influence: Political views, importance of education, impression of teachers/admins/staff, etc.
Impression of their instructor: Half a class of students were told that their supply teacher was ‘rather cold, industrious, critical, practical and determined’. The other half were told the exact same sentence, except the words ‘rather cold’ were replaced with ‘very warm’. Students who had expected to be taught by a warm teacher rated the supply teacher as much nicer and funnier than those who were expecting the teacher to be distant.
How can we do better?
Unfortunately, we all have confirmation bias. Even if you believe you are very open-minded and only observe the facts before coming to conclusions, it's very likely that at least some bias will shape your opinion in the end. It can be difficult to combat this natural tendency.
So, step 1 is awareness! It takes a conscious effort to challenge one’s own beliefs and understand what distortions might be created.
It also requires regular practice to work toward minimizing bias. So constantly challenge yourself to try some of the following suggestions! ->
How can we do better?
How can we do better?
How can we do better?
How can we do better?
How can we do better?
How can we do better?
Check the sources we’re using:
Consciously choose to read news & articles with the opposite point of view to challenge yourself.
How can we do better?
Use neutral phrases when researching: Instead of saying “Is A better than B?” try “A vs B” and then try flipping the search terms around. “Is B better than A?” or “B vs A”.
Read entire articles, rather than forming conclusions based on the headlines and pictures. - Search for credible evidence presented in the article.
Analyze if the statements being asserted are backed up by trustworthy evidence (tracking the source of evidence could prove its credibility). Don’t just share them or repeat to others verbally until you have vetted them out. If you don’t have time to do that, then don’t spread the potential misinformation!
How can we do better?
For example:
A study by Brendan Nyhan and Jason Reifler (two researchers on political misinformation) explored the effects of different types of statements on people’s beliefs. While examining two statements “I am not a Muslim, Obama says.” and “I am a Christian, Obama says,” they concluded that the latter statement is more persuasive and resulted in people’s change of beliefs, thus affirming statements are more effective at correcting incorrect views
discussion
I want to hear your ideas!
What are some ideas you have to work to overcome confirmation bias?
“Easy to spot a yellow car when you are always thinking of a yellow car. Easy to spot opportunity when you are always thinking of opportunity. Easy to spot reasons to be mad when you are always thinking of being mad. You become what you constantly think about.”
resources
Lesson for students on confirmation bias: Lesson: The Challenge of Confirmation Bias | Facing History
Summary of cognitive biases: https://betterhumans.pub/cognitive-bias-cheat-sheet-55a472476b18