100 Cognitive Biases Every Educated Adult Should Know

100 Cognitive Biases Every Educated Adult Should Know

No. Item Definition
1. Action bias Preferring action even when inaction would work better.
2. Actor–observer bias Explaining one’s behavior situationally but others’ behavior personally.
3. Ambiguity aversion Preferring known risks over unknown probabilities.
4. Anchoring bias Relying too heavily on the first information received.
5. Attentional bias Paying disproportionate attention to certain kinds of information.
6. Authority bias Giving undue weight to an authority’s views.
7. Automation bias Trusting automated recommendations despite contradictory evidence.
8. Availability bias Judging likelihood by how easily examples come to mind.
9. Bandwagon effect Adopting beliefs because many others hold them.
10. Base-rate neglect Ignoring general frequencies when judging specific cases.
11. Belief bias Judging arguments by conclusions rather than logical validity.
12. Belief perseverance Maintaining beliefs after their supporting evidence collapses.
13. Bias blind spot Recognizing others’ biases more readily than one’s own.
14. Certainty effect Giving disproportionate weight to guaranteed outcomes.
15. Choice-supportive bias Remembering chosen options more favorably than rejected alternatives.
16. Clustering illusion Seeing meaningful patterns in random clusters.
17. Compromise effect Favoring middle options over extremes.
18. Confirmation bias Favoring information that supports existing beliefs.
19. Conjunction fallacy Judging combined events likelier than one component event.
20. Curse of knowledge Struggling to imagine what less-informed people understand.
21. Decoy effect Changing preferences when an inferior alternative is introduced.
22. Default effect Disproportionately choosing the preselected option.
23. Defensive attribution Assigning blame partly to protect oneself from vulnerability.
24. Denomination effect Spending smaller denominations more readily than equivalent large ones.
25. Disposition effect Selling winning investments while holding losing investments.
26. Distinction bias Exaggerating differences when comparing options side by side.
27. Dunning–Kruger effect Poor performers overestimating their competence.
28. Egocentric bias Overestimating one’s contribution to shared activities.
29. Einstellung effect Familiar solutions block recognition of better alternatives.
30. Empathy gap Underestimating how different emotional states affect behavior.
31. Endowment effect Valuing something more because one owns it.
32. Extrinsic incentive bias Assuming others respond more to external rewards.
33. False consensus effect Overestimating how many others share one’s views.
34. False polarization Overestimating differences between opposing groups’ views.
35. False uniqueness effect Underestimating how many others share one’s desirable qualities.
36. Focusing illusion Overestimating the importance of whatever currently occupies attention.
37. Framing effect Deciding differently depending on how information is presented.
38. Fundamental attribution error Overemphasizing personality and underestimating circumstances when judging others.
39. Gambler’s fallacy Expecting random outcomes to compensate for previous results.
40. Group attribution error Assuming group decisions reflect every member’s preferences.
41. Halo effect Letting one positive trait influence unrelated judgments.
42. Hard–easy effect Overestimating success on hard tasks, underestimating easy ones.
43. Hindsight bias Seeing past events as more predictable than they were.
44. Hostile attribution bias Interpreting ambiguous behavior as intentionally hostile.
45. Hostile media effect Seeing balanced coverage as biased against one’s position.
46. Hot-hand fallacy Mistaking chance winning streaks for increased success probability.
47. Identifiable victim effect Caring more about named individuals than anonymous groups.
48. IKEA effect Overvaluing things one helped create.
49. Illusion of control Overestimating personal influence over uncontrollable events.
50. Illusion of validity Trusting coherent predictions despite weak supporting evidence.
51. Illusory correlation Perceiving a relationship that is absent or exaggerated.
52. Illusory superiority Overrating one’s qualities compared with other people’s.
53. In-group bias Favoring members of one’s own group.
54. Intentionality bias Assuming actions were deliberate rather than accidental.
55. Just-world bias Assuming people generally get what they deserve.
56. Less-is-better effect Preferring smaller offerings when options are evaluated separately.
57. Loss aversion Feeling losses more strongly than equivalent gains.
58. Mere exposure effect Liking things more after repeated exposure.
59. Misinformation effect Later misleading information alters memories of an event.
60. Money illusion Judging money by face value rather than purchasing power.
61. Mood-congruent memory bias Recalling information that matches one’s current mood.
62. Moral credential effect Using past goodness to excuse later questionable behavior.
63. Naive realism Assuming one’s perceptions reflect objective reality.
64. Negativity bias Giving negative information more weight than positive information.
65. Normalcy bias Underestimating disasters because normal conditions seem likely.
66. Not-invented-here bias Rejecting ideas because they originated elsewhere.
67. Omission bias Judging harmful inaction less harshly than harmful action.
68. Optimism bias Underestimating one’s likelihood of experiencing negative events.
69. Ostrich effect Avoiding threatening or unpleasant information.
70. Out-group homogeneity bias Seeing outsiders as more alike than group members.
71. Outcome bias Judging decisions by results rather than available information.
72. Overconfidence bias Overestimating the accuracy of one’s judgments.
73. Pessimism bias Overestimating the likelihood of negative outcomes.
74. Planning fallacy Underestimating the time and resources a task requires.
75. Present bias Giving immediate rewards disproportionate weight over future benefits.
76. Probability neglect Focusing on consequences while overlooking their likelihood.
77. Projection bias Expecting future preferences to match current preferences.
78. Pseudocertainty effect Treating a conditional outcome as guaranteed.
79. Reactive devaluation Discounting proposals because they come from an opponent.
80. Recency effect Giving recent information greater weight or better recall.
81. Recency illusion Assuming newly noticed phenomena only recently began.
82. Restraint bias Overestimating one’s ability to resist temptation.
83. Rhyme-as-reason effect Finding rhyming statements more credible than nonrhyming equivalents.
84. Rosy retrospection Remembering past experiences more positively than they felt.
85. Salience bias Overweighting prominent or emotionally striking information.
86. Scope neglect Responding insufficiently to changes in a problem’s scale.
87. Self-serving bias Claiming successes while blaming failures on external factors.
88. Shared information bias Prioritizing commonly known information over members’ unique knowledge.
89. Status quo bias Preferring existing arrangements over changes.
90. Sunk cost fallacy Continuing because of resources already spent.
91. Survivorship bias Drawing conclusions from successes while overlooking failures.
92. Telescoping effect Remembering events as closer or farther in time.
93. Third-person effect Assuming media messages influence others more than oneself.
94. Time-saving bias Misjudging how speed changes affect time saved.
95. Ultimate attribution error Explaining outsiders’ failures personally and successes situationally.
96. Unit bias Treating a supplied unit as the appropriate amount.
97. Well-traveled road effect Estimating familiar routes as shorter than unfamiliar ones.
98. Worse-than-average effect Underestimating one’s relative ability, especially on difficult tasks.
99. Zero-risk bias Preferring risk elimination over greater overall risk reduction.
100. Zero-sum bias Assuming one person’s gain requires another’s loss.