Check Your Bias
Cognitive biases and heuristics are shortcuts that our brains use to analyze information, make judgements and take decisions quickly and effortlessly. We are generally unaware of these shortcuts and how they affect our thinking process and our decision-making.
This list of common biases and heuristics can help you spot them in action, allowing you to analyze your thinking process and correct it.
The list is in alphabetical order and it will be regularly updated
Anchoring Bias
The anchoring bias is the tendency to rely on an initial piece of information (generally a number) to judge the information you are exposed to subsequently, even if they are unrelated.
Apophenia
Apophenia is the tendency to believe that there is some meaningful connection between unrelated objects, ideas or events.
Availability Bias
The availability bias is the tendency to judge events or ideas that you can easily recall as more common or more relevant than they probably are.
Belief Bias
The belief bias is the tendency to assess the validity of an argument based on how plausible or true the conclusion is rather than the strength of arguments or proof.
Confirmation Bias
The confirmation bias is the tendency to seek, pay attention to and interpret information in a way that confirms what you already believe.
Curse of Knowledge
The curse of knowledge is the tendency to unknowingly assume that everyone knows as much as you do about a certain topic.
Dunning-Kruger Effect
The Dunning-Kruger effect is the tendency to overestimate your knowledge when you know little and to underestimate your knowledge when you know a lot about a topic.
Framing Effect
The framing effect is the tendency to allow yourself to pay attention to framing, delivery and other aspects to the point that they can influence or sway your judgement or decision.
Groupthink
Groupthink is the tendency to trust the group that you are part of when making decisions and to avoid asking questions or openly criticizing their plans.
Halo Effect
The halo effect is the tendency to focus on one aspect of a person or a company and judge everything about them based on this aspect only (which can be positive or negative).
Hindsight Bias
The hindsight bias is the tendency to use the information you have in the present to conclude that the events were obvious in the past and that you had predicted them.
Outcome Bias
The outcome bias is the tendency to judge a decision based on the outcome it leads to; the quality or desirability of the outcome influences the way you assess the decision that led to it.
Sunk-Cost Bias
The sunk-cost bias is the tendency to continue investing resources in a project that is likely to fail only because you have invested a lot in it so far.