Action bias
The tendency for someone to act when faced with a problem even when inaction would be more effective, or to act when no evident problem exists.
DecisionBaseline
Pattern
Baseline
Judgment is pulled by the wrong starting point, default frame, or prior expectation.
36 biases
Biases with this pattern
This is the cross-cutting layer that helps the site feel more like a real reference and less like a flat list.
Additive bias
The tendency to solve problems through addition, even when subtraction is a better approach.
DecisionBaseline
Anchoring effect
The tendency for the first salient number, frame, or option to pull later estimates toward itself even when it is arbitrary or weakly relevant.
EstimationBaselineForecasting & planningPersonal decisions
Ballot order effect
The tendency for candidates listed first on a ballot to gain a small voting advantage.
DecisionBaseline
Base-rate neglect
The tendency to underweight general prevalence information when vivid case-specific details are available.
EstimationBaselineResearch & evidenceForecasting & planning
Bizarreness effect
The tendency to remember bizarre or unusual material better than ordinary material.
RecallBaseline
Cheerleader effect
The tendency for people to appear more attractive in a group than in isolation.
DecisionBaseline
Compromise effect
The tendency for an option to seem better when it appears as a middle compromise.
DecisionBaseline
Regressive bias
The tendency to remember high values as lower and low values as higher, pulling estimates back toward the middle.
EstimationBaseline
Decoy effect
The tendency for a dominated third option to shift preference toward a nearby target option.
DecisionBaseline
Denomination effect
The tendency to spend more money when it is denominated in small amounts rather than large amounts.
DecisionBaseline
Disposition effect
The tendency to sell an asset that has accumulated in value and resist selling an asset that has declined in value.
DecisionBaseline
Distinction bias
The tendency to view two options as more dissimilar when evaluating them simultaneously than when evaluating them separately.
DecisionBaseline
Dunning-Kruger effect
The tendency for low skill or shallow understanding to produce overestimation of one's own competence, while higher-skill people may underestimate how unusual their competence really is.
EstimationBaselineLearning & expertiseTeams & management
Frequency illusion
The tendency to notice something once and then feel as if it is suddenly everywhere.
RecallBaseline
Gambler's fallacy
The tendency to think that future probabilities are altered by past events, when in reality they are unchanged.
EstimationBaseline
Hard–easy effect
The tendency to overestimate one's ability to accomplish hard tasks, and underestimate one's ability to accomplish easy tasks.
EstimationBaseline
Hot-hand fallacy
The belief that a person who has experienced success with a random event has a greater chance of further success in additional attempts.
EstimationBaseline
Insensitivity to sample size
The tendency to under-expect variation in small samples and overread sparse data.
EstimationBaseline
Interoceptive bias
The tendency for hunger, fatigue, pain, or other bodily states to distort judgment.
EstimationBaseline
Less-is-better effect
The tendency to prefer a smaller set to a larger set judged separately, but not jointly.
DecisionBaseline
List-length effect
A smaller percentage of items are remembered in a longer list, but as the length of the list increases, the absolute number of items remembered increases as well.
RecallBaseline
Money illusion
The tendency to concentrate on the nominal value of money rather than its value in terms of purchasing power.
DecisionBaseline
Negativity bias
The tendency to give bad news, threats, criticism, and losses more psychological weight than equally sized positives.
Opinion ReportingRecallAssociationBaselineMedia & politicsTeams & management
Normalcy bias
The tendency to assume that things will keep functioning more or less normally, which leads people to underprepare for unprecedented or fast-moving disruption.
DecisionBaselineRisk judgmentPublic policy
Phantom effect
The tendency for unavailable but mentally present options to influence current choices.
DecisionBaseline
Primacy effect
The tendency to remember items at the beginning of a sequence especially well.
RecallBaseline
Projection bias
The tendency to overestimate how much your future preferences, values, and reactions will resemble whatever you feel strongly right now.
DecisionBaselinePersonal decisionsForecasting & planning
Recency effect
A form of serial position effect where an item at the end of a list is easier to recall.
RecallBaseline
Scope neglect
The tendency to respond weakly to scale, treating small and large harms or benefits as if the difference barely matters.
DecisionBaseline
Serial position effect
The tendency to remember items at the beginning and end of a sequence better than those in the middle.
RecallBaseline
Subadditivity effect
The tendency to estimate that the likelihood of a remembered event is less than the sum of its mutually exclusive components.
EstimationHypothesis AssessmentAssociationBaseline
Systematic bias
Judgement that arises when targets of differentiating judgement become subject to effects of regression that are not equivalent.
EstimationBaseline
Unit bias
The tendency to treat a standard unit or serving as the right amount to consume.
EstimationBaseline
Von Restorff effect
The tendency to remember an item better when it stands out from its surroundings.
RecallBaseline
Weber–Fechner law
Difficulty in perceiving and comparing small differences in large quantities.
EstimationBaseline