Outsmart Your Brain's Traps
8 August 2011
Read by 2210 persons
We believe we are free to choose and decide. In reality, we are influenced. To free ourselves, let's learn to identify the biases that distort judgment.
"I was wrong!" With this statement on the 8 pm news in mid-March, Carlos Ghosn admitted to wrongly accusing three executives, fired for industrial espionage based on "multiple pieces of evidence." How could a leader of this caliber have been so mistaken for weeks? "The Renault boss and his staff were blinded," says Luc de Brabandere, associate director of the Boston Consulting Group. "Since the possibility of industrial espionage wasn't impossible, they interpreted each element of the file from that angle, until they truly believed it."
No one escapes these mental processes, often unconscious, that distort our perception of reality. The work of American psychiatrist Aaron Beck on thought patterns in the 1960s, then that of American psychologists Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman theorized the role of "cognitive biases" and their impact on our reasoning. "These mental shortcuts have a big advantage: that of allowing us to quickly assess a situation," explains Pascal Vancutsem, founder of Coaching & Performance.
The prefrontal cortex, which helps us take a step back, is then short-circuited and we draw data directly from the neolimbic brain, the seat of our experiences, our knowledge, our emotions... Result: in a hundredth of a second, our neurons guide our decision. But these cognitive biases can also mislead us and lead us to make the wrong decision. While it is difficult to avoid them, knowing them at least allows us to reduce their influence. There are at least sixty of them! We present here the most frequent ones.
The anchoring bias or the art of clinging to one's first judgment
The first idea or the first impression is not always the wisest. Yet, that's what the anchoring bias leads us to believe. Let's take the example of a candidate who arrives a few minutes late for an interview. As a recruiter, you will not be able to help concluding, a little quickly, that they will never be punctual. And this label will be difficult to remove.
Know this: the anchoring bias manifests itself very strongly with numbers. "The brain fixes on a value and does not deviate from it," observes Patrick Amar, executive coach at Axis Mundi and author of "Psychology of the Manager" (Dunod). "If, during a salary negotiation, you announce a figure, your interlocutor will anchor it in their mind as a maximum, and you will have difficulty going back or starting on another basis." Moral: as soon as it is a question of numbers, avoid speaking first!
The availability bias or the difficulty of integrating new information
"Nearly 300,000 copies good to throw away!" This marketing director is furious. The magazine she's holding has been printed on matte paper and not on glossy paper, as planned. The cause: several back-and-forths with the printer, successive changes of mind on the format, colors, typography or paper quality. But above all, a bias: the availability bias. After much deliberation, the printer and she had agreed to return to the initial parameters. Everything seemed clear and under control. "Neither of them saw that the mention "matte paper," once considered, had remained on the quote," reports Mary Gohin, psychologist and coach. "The information "glossy paper," chosen for each issue, was so ingrained in their minds that they thought they saw it and missed their mistake."
It is this same bias that makes us miss the "no entry" sign when we take a street previously open to traffic. Logical: we privilege familiar, recurring or recent elements, to the point of not seeing certain changes.
The attribution bias or the propensity to draw hasty conclusions
"He's nice, this Eric. He's a life of the party and an excellent team leader!" This director of a large bank came out of a team building seminar dazzled by one of his managers, with whom he had just completed a construction game. To the point of deciding, a few months later, to appoint him director of an entity. He soon regretted it. "By questioning his team, we discovered that he behaved like a tyrant," says Arnaud Gilberton, manager at IDRH (consulting) and in charge of Eric's coaching before his entry into office.
Reason for this casting error: a decision made based on impressions taken in a non-professional context. Researchers call this the fundamental attribution error. "To appreciate a behavior," summarizes Patrick Amar, "we tend to underestimate the impact of the context, which is more complex to analyze, to focus on what is immediately visible and attribute its origin to the individual." Thus, it was the game situation, more than Eric's character, that seduced the director.
The confirmation bias or perseverance in error
"This bias can wreak havoc," warns Luc de Brabandere. As evidenced by the espionage case at Renault, disastrous in terms of image. This bias pushes the individual to interpret information in such a way that it corroborates his initial hypothesis. Unconsciously, he eliminates those that contradict it and retains (or magnifies) those that confirm it.
Convinced of Apple's superiority, Christophe Plassard, the boss of an SME of graphic design, decided a few months ago to acquire accounting software from this brand. He started by downloading a trial version. Faced with no problems, he did not question his decision and contacted his supplier. The latter was not surprised by his choice, which reinforced his certainty. When he called on an expert to train his accountant and saw the man floundering, he naturally concluded to a lack of skills. Without suspecting that the problem came from the software, in reality unsuitable for his needs. It took him fifteen days to realize this.
Christophe Plassard, fortunately, was lucid enough not to insist. Because the confirmation bias can quickly turn into an escalation of commitment. The principle: one perseveres in error, regardless of the signals, even when one begins to doubt. Recognizing one's failure would mean not only that one made a bad decision but also that one was stubborn: devastating for the image. It is this infernal spiral that led NASA executives, although alerted to technical problems, to proceed with the launch of the Challenger shuttle in 1986. It exploded on takeoff.
The framing bias or the influence of experience on our judgments or perceptions
"A2M1!" The text message sent by a colleague seemed clear to this executive: "I deciphered: at two meters ten." But, not seeing his interlocutor nearby, he remained perplexed. In fact, the text meant "tomorrow." Each person interprets messages according to their thought patterns, education and knowledge, but also their experience and background. We tend to see only what makes sense to us. To the point of reproducing certain systematics in the face of a situation that seems known and always making the same decisions. "We react according to a cognitive framework that we find it difficult to get rid of," observes Mary Gohin. "Lazy, the brain prefers to stay in its comfort zone."
Some professions approach situations with the prism of their expertise. The boss of the software publisher LQC, Laurent Quivogne, experienced this with his IT teams: "They sometimes take shortcuts: one day, faced with a client - a franchise network - they concluded that a restaurant corresponded to a manager. Yet some managers had several entities, others co-managed only one. Part of the software had to be rewritten!"
The stability bias or the danger of discarding improbable hypotheses
This error occurs as soon as a numerical reference, a statistic for example, is considered a priori indisputable and that everyone is convinced that it should not be deviated from. "It has never happened, there is no reason for the trend to change..." The worst being never considered, nothing is planned if the situation eventually occurs. The consequences can be tragic, as evidenced by recent events in Japan. The protective wall of the Fukushima power plant had been designed in view of the tsunamis that had struck the region since 1960: none had exceeded 6 meters high. The one that broke on March 11 was 14. Curiously, no account was taken of the fact that a wave had reached 28 meters in 1933 and another 38 in 1896.
The same type of scenario with the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in the spring of 2010: the oil platform leased by BP to drill a well at depths never before reached exploded, causing massive hydrocarbon leaks. For Tony Hayward, BP's boss at the time, there was only a one in a million chance of such an accident occurring.
The authority bias or the fear of contradicting the boss or the expert
By definition, the boss is always right and knows better than others. As a result, we hesitate to contradict a superior or an expert, even if we have doubts. Thus, in the Mediator affair, scientists remained silent in the face of laboratory bosses who claimed that their drug presented no danger. The Outreau trial is another illustration of the tragic effects that this bias can have. "The judge did not question the expertise of the psychiatrists, who themselves did not question the children's statements," explains Mary Gohin. "Because it was unimaginable that a child would lie about such serious facts. In this case, the children's words also held authority."
Marie-Madeleine Sève.
Published June 7, 2011.
Posted online August 8, 2011.
Capital.fr
"I was wrong!" With this statement on the 8 pm news in mid-March, Carlos Ghosn admitted to wrongly accusing three executives, fired for industrial espionage based on "multiple pieces of evidence." How could a leader of this caliber have been so mistaken for weeks? "The Renault boss and his staff were blinded," says Luc de Brabandere, associate director of the Boston Consulting Group. "Since the possibility of industrial espionage wasn't impossible, they interpreted each element of the file from that angle, until they truly believed it."
No one escapes these mental processes, often unconscious, that distort our perception of reality. The work of American psychiatrist Aaron Beck on thought patterns in the 1960s, then that of American psychologists Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman theorized the role of "cognitive biases" and their impact on our reasoning. "These mental shortcuts have a big advantage: that of allowing us to quickly assess a situation," explains Pascal Vancutsem, founder of Coaching & Performance.
The prefrontal cortex, which helps us take a step back, is then short-circuited and we draw data directly from the neolimbic brain, the seat of our experiences, our knowledge, our emotions... Result: in a hundredth of a second, our neurons guide our decision. But these cognitive biases can also mislead us and lead us to make the wrong decision. While it is difficult to avoid them, knowing them at least allows us to reduce their influence. There are at least sixty of them! We present here the most frequent ones.
The anchoring bias or the art of clinging to one's first judgment
The first idea or the first impression is not always the wisest. Yet, that's what the anchoring bias leads us to believe. Let's take the example of a candidate who arrives a few minutes late for an interview. As a recruiter, you will not be able to help concluding, a little quickly, that they will never be punctual. And this label will be difficult to remove.
Know this: the anchoring bias manifests itself very strongly with numbers. "The brain fixes on a value and does not deviate from it," observes Patrick Amar, executive coach at Axis Mundi and author of "Psychology of the Manager" (Dunod). "If, during a salary negotiation, you announce a figure, your interlocutor will anchor it in their mind as a maximum, and you will have difficulty going back or starting on another basis." Moral: as soon as it is a question of numbers, avoid speaking first!
The availability bias or the difficulty of integrating new information
"Nearly 300,000 copies good to throw away!" This marketing director is furious. The magazine she's holding has been printed on matte paper and not on glossy paper, as planned. The cause: several back-and-forths with the printer, successive changes of mind on the format, colors, typography or paper quality. But above all, a bias: the availability bias. After much deliberation, the printer and she had agreed to return to the initial parameters. Everything seemed clear and under control. "Neither of them saw that the mention "matte paper," once considered, had remained on the quote," reports Mary Gohin, psychologist and coach. "The information "glossy paper," chosen for each issue, was so ingrained in their minds that they thought they saw it and missed their mistake."
It is this same bias that makes us miss the "no entry" sign when we take a street previously open to traffic. Logical: we privilege familiar, recurring or recent elements, to the point of not seeing certain changes.
The attribution bias or the propensity to draw hasty conclusions
"He's nice, this Eric. He's a life of the party and an excellent team leader!" This director of a large bank came out of a team building seminar dazzled by one of his managers, with whom he had just completed a construction game. To the point of deciding, a few months later, to appoint him director of an entity. He soon regretted it. "By questioning his team, we discovered that he behaved like a tyrant," says Arnaud Gilberton, manager at IDRH (consulting) and in charge of Eric's coaching before his entry into office.
Reason for this casting error: a decision made based on impressions taken in a non-professional context. Researchers call this the fundamental attribution error. "To appreciate a behavior," summarizes Patrick Amar, "we tend to underestimate the impact of the context, which is more complex to analyze, to focus on what is immediately visible and attribute its origin to the individual." Thus, it was the game situation, more than Eric's character, that seduced the director.
The confirmation bias or perseverance in error
"This bias can wreak havoc," warns Luc de Brabandere. As evidenced by the espionage case at Renault, disastrous in terms of image. This bias pushes the individual to interpret information in such a way that it corroborates his initial hypothesis. Unconsciously, he eliminates those that contradict it and retains (or magnifies) those that confirm it.
Convinced of Apple's superiority, Christophe Plassard, the boss of an SME of graphic design, decided a few months ago to acquire accounting software from this brand. He started by downloading a trial version. Faced with no problems, he did not question his decision and contacted his supplier. The latter was not surprised by his choice, which reinforced his certainty. When he called on an expert to train his accountant and saw the man floundering, he naturally concluded to a lack of skills. Without suspecting that the problem came from the software, in reality unsuitable for his needs. It took him fifteen days to realize this.
Christophe Plassard, fortunately, was lucid enough not to insist. Because the confirmation bias can quickly turn into an escalation of commitment. The principle: one perseveres in error, regardless of the signals, even when one begins to doubt. Recognizing one's failure would mean not only that one made a bad decision but also that one was stubborn: devastating for the image. It is this infernal spiral that led NASA executives, although alerted to technical problems, to proceed with the launch of the Challenger shuttle in 1986. It exploded on takeoff.
The framing bias or the influence of experience on our judgments or perceptions
"A2M1!" The text message sent by a colleague seemed clear to this executive: "I deciphered: at two meters ten." But, not seeing his interlocutor nearby, he remained perplexed. In fact, the text meant "tomorrow." Each person interprets messages according to their thought patterns, education and knowledge, but also their experience and background. We tend to see only what makes sense to us. To the point of reproducing certain systematics in the face of a situation that seems known and always making the same decisions. "We react according to a cognitive framework that we find it difficult to get rid of," observes Mary Gohin. "Lazy, the brain prefers to stay in its comfort zone."
Some professions approach situations with the prism of their expertise. The boss of the software publisher LQC, Laurent Quivogne, experienced this with his IT teams: "They sometimes take shortcuts: one day, faced with a client - a franchise network - they concluded that a restaurant corresponded to a manager. Yet some managers had several entities, others co-managed only one. Part of the software had to be rewritten!"
The stability bias or the danger of discarding improbable hypotheses
This error occurs as soon as a numerical reference, a statistic for example, is considered a priori indisputable and that everyone is convinced that it should not be deviated from. "It has never happened, there is no reason for the trend to change..." The worst being never considered, nothing is planned if the situation eventually occurs. The consequences can be tragic, as evidenced by recent events in Japan. The protective wall of the Fukushima power plant had been designed in view of the tsunamis that had struck the region since 1960: none had exceeded 6 meters high. The one that broke on March 11 was 14. Curiously, no account was taken of the fact that a wave had reached 28 meters in 1933 and another 38 in 1896.
The same type of scenario with the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in the spring of 2010: the oil platform leased by BP to drill a well at depths never before reached exploded, causing massive hydrocarbon leaks. For Tony Hayward, BP's boss at the time, there was only a one in a million chance of such an accident occurring.
The authority bias or the fear of contradicting the boss or the expert
By definition, the boss is always right and knows better than others. As a result, we hesitate to contradict a superior or an expert, even if we have doubts. Thus, in the Mediator affair, scientists remained silent in the face of laboratory bosses who claimed that their drug presented no danger. The Outreau trial is another illustration of the tragic effects that this bias can have. "The judge did not question the expertise of the psychiatrists, who themselves did not question the children's statements," explains Mary Gohin. "Because it was unimaginable that a child would lie about such serious facts. In this case, the children's words also held authority."
Marie-Madeleine Sève.
Published June 7, 2011.
Posted online August 8, 2011.
Capital.fr
