Reading Notes & Thoughts from…

“Elon Musk Thinks Every Child Should Learn about these 50 Cognitive Biases” 

By Jessica Stillman , Inc Magazine

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Third-Person Effect. The third-person effect hypothesis predicts that people tend to perceive that mass media messages have a greater effect on others than on themselves, based on personal biases. The third-person effect manifests itself through an individual’s overestimation of the effect of a mass communicated message on the generalized other, or an underestimation of the effect of a mass communicated message on themselves.

These types of perceptions stem from a self-motivated social desirability (not feeling influenced by mass messages promotes self-esteem), a social-distance corollary (choosing to dissociate oneself from the others who may be influenced), and a perceived exposure to a message (others choose to be influenced by persuasive communication)

Belief Bias. Judging the strength of arguments based on the plausibility of their conclusion rather than how strongly they support that conclusion.[1] A person is more likely to accept an argument that supports a conclusion that aligns with their values, beliefs and prior knowledge, while rejecting counter arguments to the conclusion.[2] Belief bias is an extremely common and therefore significant form of error; we can easily be blinded by our beliefs and reach the wrong conclusion.

Availability Cascade. The more people believe (and talk about) something the more likely we are to think it’s true.  Again, see the earlier post about Social Proof.   Or the old “that’s what they say” argument.