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Going beyond the origins of cognitive biases, which have been the focus of continued research, the notion of metacognitive myopia refers to the failure to monitor, control, and correct for biased inferences at the metacognitive level. Judgments often follow the given information uncritically, even when it is easy to find out or explicitly explained that information samples are misleading or invalid. The present research is concerned with metacognitive myopia in judgments of change. Participants had to decide whether pairs of binomial samples were drawn from populations with decreasing, equal, or increasing proportions "p" of a critical feature. Judgments of "p" changes were strongly affected by changes in absolute sample size "n," such that only increases (decreases) in "p" that came along with increasing (decreasing) "n" were readily detected. Across 4 experiments these anomalies persisted even though the distinction of "p" and "n" was strongly emphasized through outcome feedback and full debriefing (Experiment 1-4), simultaneous presentation (Experiments 2-4), and recoding of experienced samples into descriptive percentages (Experiment 3-4). In Experiment 4, a joint attempt was made by 10 scientists working in 7 different institutions to develop an effective debiasing training, suggesting how multilab-collaboration might improve the quality of science in the early stage of operational research designing. Despite significant improvements in change judgments, debiasing treatments did not eliminate the anomalies. Possible ways of dealing with the metacognitive deficit are discussed.

Illusory correlations are thought to underlie many undesirable judgements and behaviours, such as those that result in out‐group discrimination. In this research, illusory correlations are investigated in a dynamic fashion using the serial reproduction paradigm. Specifically, participants learned about members of certain groups and behaviours that they performed or attributes that they possessed. Afterwards, they were asked to recall that information and pass it on to other participants, such that whatever memory bias they produced was built into the information that was presented to others. Results revealed a weak tendency for the first participants to perceive an illusory correlation between certain groups and certain behaviours or attributes. More importantly, this pattern grew stronger as information was communicated across participants in a communication chain. That is, the illusory correlation became larger as the information passed from one participant to the next. These results show how biases can grow in society, such that what starts out as a very small misperception can acquire large proportions when incorrect information travels through different people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: When faced with a choice between two ratios, some people prefer the option with the larger numerator instead of the larger ratio. In this study, participants read texts containing two options involving ratios, indicated their preference between those options, and recalled the texts. Using the serial reproduction method, the recall protocols were then given to other participants to read, judge, and recall. Results show that some people's representations of the problem are distorted, favoring the option with the largest numerator; these distortions are associated with increased ratio bias and are amplified as information is socially transmitted. Finally, this social amplification progressively increases the ratio bias. These results show how small biases can grow larger when information is socially transmitted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Three experiments were designed to test whether experimentally created ad hoc associative networks evoke false memories. We used the DRM (Deese, Roediger, McDermott) paradigm with lists of ad hoc categories composed of exemplars aggregated toward specific goals (e.g., going for a picnic) that do not share any consistent set of features. Experiment 1 revealed considerable levels of false recognitions of critical words from ad hoc categories. False recognitions occurred even when the lists were presented without an organizing theme (i.e., the category's label). Experiments 1 and 2 tested whether (a) the ease of identifying the categories' themes, and (b) the lists' backward associative strength could be driving the effect. List identifiability did not correlate with false recognition, and the effect remained even when backward associative strength was controlled for. Experiment 3 manipulated the distractor items in the recognition task to address the hypothesis that the salience of unrelated items could be facilitating the occurrence of the phenomenon. The effect remained when controlling for this source of facilitation. These results have implications for assumptions made by theories of false memories, namely the preexistence of associations in the activation-monitoring framework and the central role of gist extraction in fuzzy-trace theory, while providing evidence of the occurrence of false memories for more dynamic and context-dependent knowledge structures.

This research examines the metacognitive awareness that people have about their reasoning performance in the Cognitive Reflection Test (CRT). The first two studies compare confidence judgments about the CRT vs. general knowledge (GK) questions. Results show that (1) people are generally able to discriminate between correct and incorrect answers, but this ability is far from perfect, and it is greater for GK questions than for CRT problems. Indeed, and strikingly, (2) incorrect responses to CRT problems are produced with approximately the same level of confidence as correct responses to GK questions. However, (3) even though confidence is high for incorrect responses to CRT problems, it is even higher for correct responses. The results of two additional studies show that these differences in confidence are ultimately related to the conflict that CRT problems pose between intuition and deliberation. These findings have implications for the possibility of implicit error monitoring and dual-process models of overconfidence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Four studies show that people differ in their lay beliefs concerning the degree to which science can explain their mind and the minds of other people. In particular, people are more receptive to the idea that the psychology of other people is explainable by science than to the possibility of science explaining their own psychology. This self-other difference is moderated by the degree to which people associate a certain mental phenomenon with introspection. Moreover, this self-other difference has implications for the science-recommended products and practices that people choose for themselves versus others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]