Chapter 1: What are cognitive biases and why do they matter?
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Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck, and Jerry's here too, and we are getting down to business, getting right to it here on Stuff You Should Know, because we've got a lot to cover here. That's right. So, Chuck, I got a little bit of an intro.
Let's hear it. Was that it?
That wasn't it? Do you remember how homeostasis used to come up a lot?
Yes.
So for those of you who haven't been listening that long, homeostasis is what your body and your mind and your brain wants to return to, right? You just want everything nice and even keel and normal and without exerting too much effort and energy, right? That's homeostasis?
Are you asking me? Mm-hmm. Sure.
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Chapter 2: How do mental shortcuts affect our decision-making?
Yeah, I think it's kind of heartening that they, as academics, you know, got together. There were no ruffled feathers, or at least it didn't end up that way. And they worked together. It's kind of a heartening thing, I think, these days.
Yeah, there's got to be at least one. Yeah, that's right.
They came up with a program called the Heuristics and Biases Program to basically study how human beings make their decisions, how they go through life making choices when they don't have all the information at hand, all the most perfect information to make that choice, or if they don't have all the time in the world to look at the information that they do have to make that choice.
So how are people making choices Decisions, how are they making mistakes in their decision making? And they ended up coming up with a couple of different systems, one which is super quick and one which is much more deliberate.
Yeah, Daniel Kahneman came out with Thinking Fast and Slow, which was one of those super popular airport books, you know?
Yeah, Thinking, Fast and Slow.
Yes, thank you. Eat shoots and leaves. That's right. And in it, he basically lays out this kind of shorthand model. He's very explicit to say, like, this is not how, like, your brain is actually laid out, but it's a good metaphor for it. And system one is how you think quickly. You think almost unconsciously. You make rapid decisions. And that is kind of how we generally navigate life.
System two is much more deliberate. It's where we take into account different ideas. It's where we really stop and think about something before making a decision. And they're essentially competing. There's something called interference. And system one has a really great tendency to interfere with system two.
And there was a psychologist working all the way back in 1935 named John Ridley Stroop, who basically discovered the Stroop effect that is a way of demonstrating how system one interferes with the slower, more deliberate system two.
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Chapter 3: What are the different types of cognitive biases?
And later, if you ask the person who hired them. you might say, oh, well, it was because of this, this, and this, and this, when in fact, that's really just system two kind of confirming like, no, it's because the guy walked in wearing a New York Giants t-shirt.
Yeah. And we'll get into some of the problems with this stuff throughout, but this is a good example, right? If the opposite happened, if like you didn't hire somebody because they weren't quite like you, that's an example of a bias too, even if you don't think That that's why you did it. If you're looking at their CV afterward and you're like, oh, they didn't graduate from college, that's why.
But really, it was not because you're racist. It's not because you're a woman hater. It was because you're preserving your own level of comfort because other groups that are different than you make you uncomfortable. And that's how groups can become entrenched, right? Yeah.
Once one group kind of dominates an organization, they tend to continue doing that because people hire other people who they're comfortable around rather than pushing themselves outside of their comfort zone and probably improving their organization. And that's why diversity programs exist in the first place, because of that human tendency.
Or maybe they were just a Jets fan.
That's possible. I mean, no Jets fan is going to hire a Giants fan.
Yeah, well, here's a tip. I don't know a lot about interviewing other than be yourself and try and get someone to like you, but don't go into any interview wearing any sort of branded sports apparel.
Yeah, especially a jersey. Yeah. I think that says quite a bit.
Yeah, you wear that Giants jersey in there. Well, I guess you're rolling the dice. You've either got that job or there's no way you're going to get it, so... Maybe it's not a bad idea then. I don't even know what I'm, I might be wrong.
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Chapter 4: How does the availability heuristic influence our perceptions?
So these things basically go hand in hand. It's basically how we see ourselves in a great light, how we see other people in a more negative light. Self-serving bias is basically saying if something good happens to you, it's because you are good, like you earned it. It's because of you doing something right. If something bad happens to you, it's external forces that made that happen. Right.
But fundamental attribution error is the exact opposite with other people. If they do something right, it was just luck. If something bad happens to them, it's their own fault. So a good example of this is like if a coworker comes in late one day, you're like, they're just lazy and slack. But then you come in late the next day and you're like, it was traffic.
That's basically those two things going hand in hand. And those are both biases.
Yeah.
Yeah. And I hope people understand that, like, all of those things can also be true. You know, sure. So if you're if you're thinking like, well, no, but some, you know, sometimes I did deserve the thing and sometimes it was someone's fault. Yeah, sure. That can happen. That's we're not these aren't absolutes.
No, it's more just, yeah, your tendency to think in certain ways. Yeah, sometimes you're going to be right, sometimes you're going to be wrong, for sure.
Like humanity's tendency. Yeah, you got to take a big broad view here.
Yeah, but also you specifically.
Right.
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Chapter 5: What is the impact of confirmation bias on our beliefs?
But that's what I'm saying. What you make should always be the answer.
Exactly. You just want to add, I don't know, 50% to what you actually want, and then you're ready for negotiation. There's the one other thing that's related to this framing bias, and that's basically the same thing, but rather than the first piece of information guiding you, this is more directly guiding you. So, for example, some drug,
maker says 10% of patients die you're like oh god that's a lot right you could say it the opposite way 90% of patients live you're like oh that's great right same amount of people dying it's just framed differently to exploit your your response
To exploit your aversion to dying.
Pretty much. And that's a human thing, isn't it?
For sure. Shall we take a break? Yeah. All right. Josh said human thing, so it's time for a break, and we're going to come back with more biases right after this.
What do you do when the headlines don't explain what's happening inside of you? I'm Ben Higgins, and if you can hear me, it is where culture meets the soul, a place for real conversation. Each episode, I sit down with people from all walks of life, celebrities, thinkers, and everyday folks, and we go deeper than the polished story.
We talk about what drives us, what shapes us, and what gives us hope. We get honest about the big stuff. Identity when you don't recognize yourself anymore. Loss that changes you. Purpose when success isn't enough. Peace when your mind won't slow down. Faith when it's complicated. Some guests have answers. Most are still figuring it out.
If you've ever felt like there has to be more to the story, this show is for you. Listen to If You Can Hear Me on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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Chapter 6: How do cognitive biases affect decision-making in economics?
Yeah. Two groups, two basketballs. And you're what you're told is the task at hand is to count the number of times that people in white, the white team are passing the basketball. So you're counting. All right. One, two, three, four, four, five, six, seven. And that's all you're supposed to do. And at the end, you're supposed to say, you know, how many times they pass a basketball. All right.
And now now hit him, hit him with the good stuff.
So apparently, half of the people who do this, which is astounding to me, half of the people who watch this video and take this test don't notice that in the middle of it, a person in a gorilla suit walks into frame And turns to the camera and I think beats on their chest and then walks out of frame.
Like in the middle of these people throwing these basketballs around the gorilla, half of the people are paying such close attention to counting how many times the people wearing white T-shirts are passing the basketball that they do not notice the gorilla until the end of the video when it's pointed out.
Yeah. And we're assuming it's a person in a gorilla costume. I'm hoping. First of all, that might be a bias at play that it's not a real gorilla.
Well, I guess it depends on the amount of funding they had.
Yeah, it looks actually like the gorilla from Trading Places.
It totally does. Which is like, were they even trying?
No.
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Chapter 7: What strategies can help mitigate cognitive biases?
So there's another one that you may have heard of before, even if you've not heard of any of these other ones, called the Dunning-Kruger effect. It became kind of viral because if you take it through the pop culture meat grinder, it becomes much more simplified and kind of loses some of its actuality. But people still like it because it's a good way to put other people down.
Yeah, it is. This is the idea that the correct idea is that people with little understanding in an area tend to overestimate their ability and their knowledge about something.
Right.
Because they don't they know so little they don't even know what they don't know, kind of.
Right. Exactly.
But what you are talking about, it's kind of been transformed into like morons have them are the most like braggadocious, which can be true.
Yeah.
It can be. You know, I think that's one of the things, like you said, you can be right with cognitive biases. You're not wrong with them all the time. So, yeah, that kind of supports that. But that's not what the Dunning-Kruger effect actually says. You said it.
And then there's the opposite way, too, where the more experience you have, the more expert you are in a field, the more you assume that it should be easier for you than it is.
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Chapter 8: How can understanding cognitive biases improve our lives?
Because the basically the only evidence you have there is that this woman is very athletic and fit. You might say personal trainer. But if you took all the base rate information into account, you would know that even the very, say, very small portion of teachers who are very fit and athletic.
may be small compared to the total number of teachers, it's still much larger than the total number of personal trainers in the world. So statistically speaking, it's much likelier that that very fit athletic woman is a teacher and not a personal trainer. You don't do that because you think personal trainer, athletic fit must be a personal trainer.
You've just fallen prey to the base rate fallacy, my friend.
Yeah, but she has on yoga pants and hokas. Exactly. That doesn't narrow down anything these days, you know?
How about the mirror exposure effect, Chuck? And like mirror is part of it. I'm not making a judgment about it.
That's right. That means just merely being exposed to something has a vast impact. So the more we experience something, the more you like it, which is why you see that commercial for the thing over and over and over, that Burger King ad over and over and over. Although I wouldn't say that you might like that one the more you heard it. That's the outlier for me too.
But that, that's the idea though. There's just, just mere exposure. We'll, we'll get you there.
And then there's a related thing called the illusory truth effect, which is basically that repeated exposure to a lie causes you to eventually believe in it if you hear it enough times, even if you initially knew that it wasn't true. So that makes me wonder if like it just wears you down over time, like your brain is tired of defending itself against being assailed with a lie.
And it's just like, fine, that's true. I don't I don't care.
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