The availability heuristic with famous names: a replication

S J McKelvie1, A Drumheller

  • 1Department of Psychology, Bishop's University, Lennoxville, Quebec, Canada. smckelvi@ubishops.ca

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The Availability Heuristic01:08

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A heuristic is a general problem-solving framework (Tversky & Kahneman, 1974). You can think of these as mental shortcuts that are used to solve problems. Different types of heuristics are used in different types of situations, and the impulse to use a heuristic occurs when one of five conditions is met (Pratkanis, 1989):
The Representativeness Heuristic02:13

The Representativeness Heuristic

The representative heuristic describes a biased way of thinking, in which you unintentionally stereotype someone or something. For example, you may assume that your professors spend their free time reading books and engaging in intellectual conversation, because the idea of them spending their time playing volleyball or visiting an amusement park does not fit in with your stereotypes of professors.
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Hindsight bias leads you to believe that the event you just experienced was predictable, even though it really wasn’t. In other words, you knew all along that things would turn out the way they did. Can you relate this to the phrase "Hindsight is 20/20" now?
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Nonconscious Mimicry

Nonconscious mimicry occurs when individuals alter their mannerisms to match the behaviors and expressions of those nearby, without intention.
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Social proof is a form of persuasion based on comparison and conformity. People compare their behavior and actions to what others are doing and will change to conform to do what their peers do.
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First impressions play a crucial role in social perception, shaping how individuals assess others in professional, academic, and interpersonal contexts. Psychological research highlights the significance of cognitive biases, such as the primacy and recency effects, which influence how people interpret and recall information.The Primacy Effect and Cognitive AnchoringThe primacy effect describes the tendency for initial information to impact judgment disproportionately. When individuals encounter...