Availability cascade
A belief becoming more plausible through repeated public repetition, social uptake, and feedback.
Hypothesis AssessmentAssociation
Learning Path
Misinformation, Memory, And Crowds
A path for the way repeated claims spread, harden, survive correction, and recruit social uptake long after the original evidence deserved it.
9 biases
Applied
50 min
By the end of this path
- See how repetition, correction failure, and uptake pressure combine in information-rich environments.
- Trace claims back to source quality instead of circulation quality.
- Teach a clearer difference between retrieval, popularity, and verification.
How to study it
Work the pages in order, then loop back and compare which distortions happened earliest, which ones protected the first impression, and which ones interfered with later learning.
Next:
Biases in this path
This is a deliberate sequence, not just a themed pile. Start at the top if the context is new to you.
Bandwagon effect
The tendency to do things because many other people do the same.
Opinion ReportingOutcome
Continued influence effect
Misinformation continues to influence memory and reasoning about an event, despite the misinformation having been corrected.
RecallInertia
Frequency illusion
The tendency to notice something once and then feel as if it is suddenly everywhere.
RecallBaseline
False memory
The tendency to mistake imagination, suggestion, or reconstruction for an actual memory.
RecallAssociation
Availability heuristic
The tendency to judge frequency, risk, or importance by how easily examples come to mind.
EstimationAssociationMedia & politicsPersonal decisions
Apophenia
The tendency to perceive meaningful connections or patterns between unrelated things.
Causal AttributionOutcome
Confirmation bias
The tendency to notice, seek, and remember evidence that supports the story you already prefer more readily than evidence that threatens it.
Hypothesis AssessmentOutcomeMedia & politicsResearch & evidence
Bias blind spot
The tendency to see oneself as less biased than other people, or to be able to identify more cognitive biases in others than in oneself.
Opinion ReportingSelf-Perspective