In the past four decades, behavioral economists and cognitive psychologists have discovered many cognitive biases human brains fall prey to when thinking and deciding. Cognitive biases are tendencies to think in certain ways that can lead to systematic deviations from a standard of rationality or good judgment. These biases arise from errors of memory, social attribution, and miscalculations such as statistical errors or a false sense of probability. Some social psychologists believe our cognitive biases help us process information more efficiently, especially in dangerous situations. Still, they lead us to make grave mistakes. We may be prone to such errors in judgment, but at least we can be aware of them. Bayesian reasoning offers a way to improve on the native human reasoning style. Reasoning naively, we tend not to seek alternative explanations, and sometimes underrate the influence of prior probabilities in Bayes' theorem. Credits: Wikipedia, LessWrong.org

1. COGNITIVE BIASES
How our minds trick us

2. What are Cognitive Biases?
• They are rules of thumb that help us make sense of the world and reach
decisions with relative speed. Often a result of our attempt to simplify
information processing.
• They allow us to reach decisions quickly, which can be vital if we are facing
a dangerous or threatening situation.
• May lead to more effective actions in a given context.
• Enable faster decisions when timeliness is more valuable than accuracy
(heuristics).

3. But wait…that sounds VERY NICE!

4. What are Cognitive Biases?
• Sometimes they trip us up, leading to poor decisions, perceptual
distortion, flaws in judgment, illogical interpretation, or what is
broadly called irrationality.
• They arise from errors of memory, social attribution, and
miscalculations (such as statistical errors or a false sense of probability).
• They are similar to optical illusions: the error remains compelling even
when one is fully aware of its nature. Therefore, they are difficult to
overcome :-(

5. What causes a Cognitive Bias?
• Limits on the mind's ability to process information.
• Heuristics, or information-processing shortcuts.
• Social pressure / social influence.
• Individual motivations.
• Emotional or moral motivations.

6. Types of Cognitive Biases

7. SocialBiases

8. MemoryBiases

9. Decision-makingBiases

10. Decision-makingBiases

11. Decision-makingBiases

12. Decision-makingBiases

13. Decision-makingBiases

14. ProbabilityBiases

15. ProbabilityBiases

16. ProbabilityBiases

17. ProbabilityBiases

19. REDUCING COGNITIVE BIAS
CBMT and Bayesian Reasoning

20. Cognitive Bias Modification Therapy
• Process of modifying cognitive biases and changing mental habits in
healthy people.
• Encourages individuals to use controlled processing compared to
automatic processing.
• Technology assisted therapies that are delivered via a computer with
minimal supervision. Do not require meetings with a therapist.
• CBMT programs are very simple and seem like a repetitive computer
game. - demanding and + acceptable to patients than traditional therapies.

22. Bayesian Reasoning
Bayes’ Theorem
If cause A might be the reason for symptom
X, then we have to take into account both:
• The probability that A caused X (found,
roughly, by multiplying the frequency of A
with the chance that A causes X)
• The probability that anything else caused
X.

23. Bayesian Reasoning
A mindset that takes these three tenets fully into account:
1. Any given observation has many different possible causes.
2. How we interpret any event, and the new information we get from
anything, depends on information we already had.
3. We can use the concept of probability to measure our subjective
belief in something.