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Jimmy Stephens,Webmaster
Jimmy Stephens,Webmaster
17 comments:
I think an instance of confirmation bias would be people who believe in and read horoscopes. Horoscopes are usually pretty vague and what is said in them can be interpreted in a variety of ways so they are applicable to a multitude of people and situations. Usually people who read their horoscopes want to believe what they say is true and have a confirmation bias.
For example, if bob's horoscope says "you will find a good luck charm today," bob is going to keep any eye out for anything he thinks will be his good luck charm. He may spot a penny on the sidewalk that usually would have gone unnoticed had he not been looking out for his good luck charm. What would have been, on any other day, an ordinary coin that bob wouldn't have bothered to pick up, is now lucky thanks to their horoscope. If he finds that his horoscope wasn't true, bob will most likely just disreguard it and read his horoscope the next day in hopes that it will be true. Bob might even blame his faulty horoscope on himself, and in the example of the good luck charm, come to the conclusion that perhaps he wasn't looking hard enough and accidentally passed it up. The times that bob's horoscopes are true bypass and override the times that his horoscopes are not true in his mind.
The idea that having your child listen to classical music at an early age will make them smart seems like a confirmation bias. First off, this has been made believeable because wherever you read about it, it is likely to contain the words, "leading scientists say" in it, making it sound official. Also, the process of coming to this conclusion is pseudoscientific because it takes factors like the large amount of brain development in infants and the fact that some children develope quickly or more thoroughly than others and use them to justify their conclusions. The acceptance of these things at face value is a notable confirmation bias in parents today, because they will mistake the natural increase in coordination and cognition of infants as the work of Mozart in their environment.
An example of confirmation bias would be the folowing:
Let's say that I bought a shirt on sale at Target. I think it's a bargain, especially because we always hear how expensive those department store are. A few days later I go to the mall and see the exact same shirt I bought at Target for one-third the price!
This is a confirmation bias because before going shopping, I already have the bias that Target's prices are cheaper than those at the department store. This is confirmed (or apparently seems to be) when I actually see the same merchandise at differing prices.
We use confirmation biases every time we have to write an essay for our English class. We tend to have an idea in mind about what our essay would be about, and we select quotes that only help our thesis, nothing else. This relates directly to confirmation bias, except that the thesis replaces the hypothesis.
For example, we have an essay about Medea and our thesis is "Medea wants to kill her children as a direct result of Jason's betrayal." (Yeah, I know the thesis includes no literary merit) You may leave out the part where Medea states, "Farewell to the plans I had before. I'll take my children with me when I leave. Why should I, just to cause their father pain," (p. 104 lines 1066-1068) but instead record, "O sons, you were destroyed by your father's sickness," (p. 117 line 1413) just to prove your thesis/hypothesis.
A conformation bias would be that Barack Obama is black, while he may have the features of a black male and the skin color that does that mean he is genetically only black. He is half white and this goes with along with many other ethnicities. Such as when somebody see's a hispanic they automatically assume they are Mexican, or an asian person and it is automatically assumed they are chinese. These are just the most common stereotypes that are seen in America so it is implanted in people and they assume what may not be true.
An example of confirmation bias could be how most students, especially little kids, believe pretty much everything their teachers tell them. As kids we are taught that adults are right and teachers are right so as we automatically assume that most of the information our teachers are teaching us is right because of our pre notions on teachers and adults.
I always love the birrliant example of Jesus' face being found on a peice of toast. do you honestlly think for a second that an athiest would have pulled a peice of toast out of the toaster and have seen jesus on it. the answer to this rehtorical question is know, in ever instance i know of these faces of Jesus were always found be christians who in desperation were looking for a sign from above. this i belive can be a pretty compeling example of "Confirmation Bias".
Wow, i enjoyed those examples guys, especially connor's...lol...toast.
Eh-hem. So my favorite conformation bias that I can think of is from the Nickelodeon show called Avatar: The Last Airbender. There is this episode that deals with this village that takes predictions from this old woman called Madame Wu. similar to horoscopes, as winter said. One dude said that madame Wu told him he would meet the love of his life while wearing red shoes. Then on, he wore red shoes everyday, so the prediction would come true. Another one is Madame Wu predicts that the volcano near the village will not destroy it that year. Later, the volcano erupts, and nearly destroys the village, but Aang and Katara stop the lava flow to save the village. The village people still say the prediction came true, which it did, only because other people were forced to save them.
I think an example of confirmation bias would be watching a scary movie. One may see the previews shown previous to the actual movie coming out, so he or she has the time in between watching the previews and watching the scary movie to build up an idea of how scary the movie is going to be. When the time comes to watch the scary movie they had seen previews of and had heard people who've seen it talk about it, we then make the bias in our minds that the movie is going to scare us and make us jump out of our seats. When the music takes on the foreboding tone, hinting that something scary is going to happen, we automatically assume something will happen that will make us jump out of our seats. We however do not realize that this scene is only scary because of the loud, suspenseful sounds and (sometimes) the very good acting of the characters. Despite all this, we choose to be scared, because we've been taught it is by the reaction of those who've seen it before us and because we've set our minds to emphasize the "scary" parts.
Cooper,
I think you might be confused about confirmation bias. In a confirmation bias situation you have the outcome already determined before you begin the process analysis. In your situation, you would have developed a thesis statement before you’ve ever read the play. However, in literary analysis you read the work first and then develop a thesis in response to your reading. Analysis is a reflective process that looks at one aspect of an artistic piece. It differs from confirmation bias in that its focus is determined after you have observed the piece.
Riely,
I think you’re talking more about gullibility and less about confirmation bias. With confirmation bias we see a pattern that we want to see in events or experience. With your example, you are talking about people who do not question. Confirmation bias implies that we question; we just already have the answers before we even ask.
Ronnoc21,
Tone down your own bias when answering this question. Also fix your grammar.
Patricia,
Confirmation bias in this situation would be similar to the following scenario. You go to a scary movie and are already scared without seeing the film. In your example you cite too many outside influences. All of which are observable and you could build an objective hypothesis from those observations. However, with confirmation bias you shape the experience to fit your predisposed bias.
An example of a confirmation bias would be people who believe that by putting their children into an activity such as band results in their children becoming smarter. In reality it is just the reoccuring of people of higher intelligence taking interest in an activity such as band. Being in band does not truly make you smarter but the fact that you are in an activity that does require skill, dedication, and a large use of your brain tends to be a correlation with intelligence.
Confirmation Biases would be how people think that if they start their children in orchestra at a very young age that they are much more likely to succedd in life and me much more prepared than the other students. Which in reality is just a concept and not a fact.
An example of confirmation bias would be the difference between work and play. We work for money but we play for fun. Someone may make burgers on a grill and love making these cheap delicious snacks for anyone who wants them during his free time. But when he is placed behind a grill at mcdonalds, is payed for his efforts, and is serving cheap delicious burgers, he no longer enjoys the process. This is due to the bad connotation linked to the words job or work, causing people to automatically assume they can't enjoy what they are doing.
For some reason, I find that people who disprove God or disprove the idea of Evolution have a confirmation bias. Why? Because I believe that people who completely disclude one or the other have a bias on what the real possibility could be. For example, people who say no to the chance of genetics of animals being similar due to the Evolution theory simply because they don't want to believe it is a confirmation bias. Then again, people who can't believe in miracles or stimata, things like that, just because there is no logical reasoning behind it, also have a bias because they refuse to see a left or right to both sides of a circle.
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