Bias, which is simply when we think in a way that leads us to be wrong, is unavoidable and hard to recognize. There are thousands of different types of bias but one of the most interesting and familiar to me is called confirmation bias, which is a tendency to search, interpret and recall information that reinforces or confirms our overall beliefs rather than contradicting them. In this essay, I will talk about confirmation bias from three dimensions: why would I have confirmation bias? What sort of confirmation bias do I have in my daily life? And how can I avoid it in the future? First in foremost, I am human, and one of human’s characteristics is to form confirmation biases in our growth: we are all born ignorant, so
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When I consider which products and brands I need to buy, I will engage in internal search, the process of recalling stored information from memory, and external search, the process of collecting information from environment. Nevertheless, they are not always accurate because of confirmation bias. For example, last time, I was buying clothes and considering which brands to choose, Uniqlo or Zara. The fact is that I have bought Uniqlo for many times, although my friends said that Zara’s clothes are more fashionable, I prefer Uniqlo due to its comfort and simple, and I recalled some negative information related to Zara like someone found a bug in the interlayer of the clothes and Zara’s clothes always imitates top designers’. Also, my strong price-quality belief causes me to belief that the more expensive a product, the better its quality. As a result, I tend to search more information for higher priced brands such as Estée Lauder, Lancôme and ignore the inexpensive products with high quality. Moreover, confirmation biases impact how I gather and recall information, but they also influence how I interpret information. Take palm reading as an example. I always believe palm reading can learn my personalities and predict my future, so that despite the expert of palmistry say something that totally irrelevant to me, I will
When I consider which products and brands I need to buy, I will engage in internal search, the process of recalling stored information from memory, and external search, the process of collecting information from environment. Nevertheless, they are not always accurate because of confirmation bias. For example, last time, I was buying clothes and considering which brands to choose, Uniqlo or Zara. The fact is that I have bought Uniqlo for many times, although my friends said that Zara’s clothes are more fashionable, I prefer Uniqlo due to its comfort and simple, and I recalled some negative information related to Zara like someone found a bug in the interlayer of the clothes and Zara’s clothes always imitates top designers’. Also, my strong price-quality belief causes me to belief that the more expensive a product, the better its quality. As a result, I tend to search more information for higher priced brands such as Estée Lauder, Lancôme and ignore the inexpensive products with high quality. Moreover, confirmation biases impact how I gather and recall information, but they also influence how I interpret information. Take palm reading as an example. I always believe palm reading can learn my personalities and predict my future, so that despite the expert of palmistry say something that totally irrelevant to me, I will